#I really had a spark for programming and conception which I never had for networks and cybersec | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

rose-margarita · 6 years ago

Text

the context

Dec 3-4, 8:31 am

Hello from a chronic extrovert (I’ve had many a debate about the usefulness of these American-produced descriptor words and the consequences of shoving people into predetermined categories). Yet I still consider myself an extrovert, like it’s just another freckle on my face after a long summer at the beach. And this extroversion has earned me the title of “wiz friend-maker.” A fortuitous skill in a graduate program centered around networking (I despise that whole concept). But I’ve reached a point where I’ve become so mired in sadness, confusion, anger, self-doubt, rupturing inside at times, and it all spills out, all over the people around me, my new, amazing grad school friends who I feel so close to but have only known for four months. I don’t really want to scare them away, so I thought it best to turn to an emotionless computer screen that won’t get fed up with my incessant bad vibes.

It’s a cycle. Every year it happens like this; normally centered around some sort of emotional turmoil surrounding a man in my life. I’m nearly two months into birth control - also not helping me very much.

This story will start with a man. A man who unexpectedly took my life by storm.

Fresh from a summer of working out, eating vegan, and looking and feeling undeniably beautiful, I was unstoppable my first few months of grad school. Even when imposter syndrome hit me hard like an unexpected slap in the face, I still felt like a conqueress. Walking and talking with confidence, making friends effortlessly, and also genuinely, an important point to mention. I felt like I was back at my privileged northern-Virginia high school, except this go-round everyone is popular and singing kumbaya through the halls. I had come to find a purpose in life, a path to wander (at a brisk, acceptable pace of course), a dream to strive for, and although it wasn’t quite clear to me yet (I’m not even halfway through my 20s), I knew I was on the way to finding it.

One day I went to a brunch. Amongst the shakshuka and foul, I experienced a rare moment of introversion while sitting in a neighbor’s home, hearing everyone around me speaking Spanish and convincing myself no one liked me. And there was one beautiful man who only exchanged a handful of words with me, and then seemingly lost interest. I was unaccustomed to feeling left out and began recalling moments from childhood defined by utter loneliness. The neighbor who had so graciously invited my roommates and me into his home on this lovely Saturday morning was the type of guy who makes an initial pass at every new woman he meets, just because he can. I was also in a stage of uncomfortably shying away from his advances, especially because my roommate seemed particularly interested at the time.

A few days later I asked the aforementioned neighbor for beautiful man’s number, partly to get neighbor off my back, and partly to alleviate the nagging annoyance in the back of my mind that I missed out on a potential friendship (hyper extrovert fomo, I know I know). I swiftly typed his number into my phone and shot him a message asking him to drinks. We agreed on Sunday night after his intramural soccer game. And so we met, and we chatted. About life, about Judaism, about soccer, about Chile and New York, about many topics that have already slipped my mind. It’s already been about two months since that night.

We decided to keep the night going, walking away from my house towards his after we finished dinner. It was already midnight and the target bar had long closed for the night. We just so happened to be across the street from his house, so we decided to go up to his place for tea and a smoke. Which turned into two hours of chatting on his couch.

As I prepared to leave, we stood up in unison, and he kissed me. Tiny electric sparks spread from my lips up my cheeks and down my neck, dancing along my spine to all the secret places that rarely feel this tingly, frantic sensation. That moment ended it all. I lost all faculties, which has led me into this deep, dark hole of confused, convoluted complexity.

Two months of joy, of the best physical connection I’ve ever experienced, of needing some sort of definition, reassurance from him after a certain point that we are together, that we are real, that this is committed, loving, healthy.

Some days we’re “together” in his mind, other days we’re some indescribable thing that leaves me feeling utterly alone in the worst way, the sort of way you feel alone in a crowded room, while the person you adore most is sitting right next to you.

So here are my options:

1) Deal with it. He sees no future because I’m too young, because we are in different phases of our lives, because I don’t understand his culture and I don’t speak his first language. In short - he doesn’t see a future with me, he doesn’t really want to be with me, and he doesn’t want to call himself my boyfriend because he’s tired of relationships that don’t last a long time. He’s looking for a forever love, and I’m not eligible for that title.

I have the option to never bring up anything regarding status or titles again and continue the way we have been going, because it’s true that over the past few months he’s slowly warmed, we’ve slowly built a real friendship despite going from 0-100 that first night. So there’s a possibility he would fall into an unexpected love with me if it happened subliminally, but I have no chill, so I feel like this option would tear me the fuck apart.

He doesn’t show interest in being with other women. When we are together, he is only looking at me. The underlying feelings are there. The potential is there. But most likely these possibilities will remain completely untapped because he has indefinitely shut me out from the possibility of becoming his everything.

But if I can chill, it could end peacefully one day and I could re-conceptualize all the time spent together not as a waste, but as an adventure. He fascinates me, his brain is amazing, and I adore him. If I could see him first and foremost as a person in my life who could be important, a meaningful friend in the future, then this could be beautiful regardless of status. If I could be confident enough to stand on my own and not let other people tear me apart, not let the past trauma of my brother dictate my current mental state, then this could be an amazing year with an amazing guy.

This would also require me to stop talking to all my friends about it, collecting their opinions. My roommates are my age - they are smart and want the best for me, but they don’t understand him. They don’t know what it’s like to be in your 30s, to feel like you want something real and sustainable. To feel that you no longer want to live in the “anything goes” mentality. Rather, you want to find someone who is also ready to settle down.

2) Be his friend. Keep talking, keep supporting, keep being there, being above the pain and confusion, possibly dealing with him being with other people, but remembering that I am the master of my own life and no man can dictate who I am or how I feel.

3) Nothing. Radio silence, like nothing ever happened between us.

But one thing is for sure: I need to retake control of my life, my emotions, my negative thoughts that are eating me alive. It must be my birth control, because this behavior is so ridiculously unlike me. I feel sick, confused, alone, heartbroken, sometimes I feel like I’m dying. Everything seems like the end of the world recently. So hopefully this tiny diary will be a breathe of fresh air. A place to sift through my thoughts.

We don’t get this time back. Life goes by, day by day, and we have no option but to deal with the daily emotions, events, people, that come to us. It’s up to us how we choose to react, to perceive even. One thing is absolutely certain - reframing my life at this point in time is crucial for my mental health. I have no choice, because I refuse to waste more time in a sickening, depressive haze.

Step 1: Work on the relationship I’m in with myself, not the one I’m semi-in with some unreliable man.

#strifelife #loveandconfusion

1 note · View note

noisemakerreviews · 6 years ago

Text

‘Joker’ Paints An Uncomfortable Picture of Today’s World

Never did I think I’d see the day where I could parallel even the darkest of Batman themes to the world we live in.

Todd Phillips’ latest blockbuster Joker stars Joaquin Phoenix as the clown prince of crime we all know and love. Phillips’ other films include the Hangover trilogy, but this new film doesn’t have a happy go-lucky trio trying to remember their drunken stupors and find their fourth mate.

Joker makes the audience laugh, but in a nervous, sort of uncomfortable way.

At the Venice Film Festival, Joker received an eight-minute standing ovation.

Reviews poured in following the Italian premiere and they backed up the hype. Mark Hughes of Forbes said, “The fact is, everyone is going to be stunned by what Phoenix accomplishes, because it’s what many thought impossible — a portrayal that matches and potentially exceeds that of The Dark Knight’s Clown Prince of Crime.”

The film opens with Phoenix touching up his makeup in front of a vanity. He hooks his fingers in the corners of his mouth and pulls them upward in a smile, downwards in a frown, then back up again; a single, mascara-stained tears roll down his cheek, and laughter ensues.

Phoenix plays Arthur Fleck, an eccentric man with a funny laugh and a horrifying past, searching for his identity. The film encapsulates Arthur’s journey with himself and his downward spiral into becoming the Joker.

There are some prevalent themes within Joker that are worth talking about; the most prevalent being mental health and its effect on people in today’s society. There are several scenes in which Phoenix is sitting in front of his therapist, and she eventually jerks the needle off the record and informs him that the city has cut the clinic’s funding and their meetings must come to an end. The therapist goes on to claim that the higher-ups, “don’t give a shit,” about people like him or her.

According to the National Survey of Drug Use and Health, in 2016, 9.8 million adults aged 18 or older in the U.S. had a serious mental illness; 2.8 million of those adults were below the poverty line. Insurance companies have also been known to skimp when it comes to mental health cases, which makes it that much harder for people relating to Arthur to seek help. According to a study published by Milliman, in 2015, behavioral care was four to six times more likely to be provided out-of-network than medical or surgical care. In President Trump’s proposed 2020 budget, his administration aims to cut $241 billion from Medicaid, an assistance program that provides healthcare to low-income Americans.

Dancing is a symbol that is heavy in Joker. According to a Harvard study, “dance helps reduce stress, increases levels of the feel-good hormone serotonin, and helps develop new neural connections, especially in regions involved in executive function, long-term memory, and spatial recognition.” After especially tense scenes, Arthur begins a slow, emphasized dance routine that is hauntingly beautiful.

With mental health being such a prevalent theme, Arthur clinging onto dancing as a coping mechanism or escape from the world backs up the analysis that he’s doing it to improve his mental health — or at least attempt to.

In any Batman rendition — comics, movies, TV shows, video games — Gotham is always on fire… literally. In Joker, we see a bright Gotham in the beginning, with normal big-city crimes happening: teenagers stealing things, muggings, etc. By the end of the film, Arthur has bred chaos in the streets, and we see the imagery of Gotham that has become so prevalent within the Batman universe. In both Arthur and Gotham’s descent into madness, there’s an arc that’s ever present: protesting the elite.

All around the country, protests have emerged to combat the elite. Most recently, climate change has brought criticism on the world’s elite members and their inability to make a change. In the past, police brutality has created protests in riots from victim’s families and their supporters, calling for change in law enforcement procedures. Countless marches have been held in response to several pieces of legislations passed (abortion laws, Planned Parenthood budget cuts, LGBTQ+ rights).

“Kill The Rich” is a headline that pops up time and time again throughout the film, feeding into this “protest the elite” arc. Arthur guns down three rich men in the subway following their harassment of a woman and a physical altercation between himself and the men. This sparks a movement within Gotham that empowers Arthur and makes him feel noticed, something he’d never experienced in his life before. Citizens of Gotham supporting this movement don clown masks to imitate the suspect, aka, Arthur.

Joker has faced its fair share of backlash. Stephanie Zacharek of Time Magazine took no prisoners in her review, stating that Joker, “lionizes and glamorizes Arthur even as it shakes its head, faux-sorrowfully, over his violent behavior.” Other reviews have had similar opinions. In 2012, a mass shooting broke out at a Colorado movie theatre during The Dark Knight Rises premiere. The assailant fatally shot 12 people. Family members of the slain victims wrote a letter to Warner Bros. expressing their concerns.

Sandy Phillips, mother to 24-year-old victim Jessica Ghawi, told The Hollywood Reporter, “I don't need to see a picture of [the gunman]; I just need to see a Joker promo and I see a picture of the killer … My worry is that one person who may be out there — and who knows if it is just one — who is on the edge, who is wanting to be a mass shooter, may be encouraged by this movie. And that terrifies me.”

In what is perhaps its most iconic scene, Arthur eccentrically dances down the stairs that we see him trudge up throughout the film. This is also the first time we see him in that iconic purple suit, green hair, and a full face of makeup. He is dancing to Gary Glitter’s “Rock and Roll Part Two,” which has earned the film more backlash. Gary Glitter is a convicted pedophile currently serving a 16-year prison sentence. According to CNBC, Glitter is allegedly slated to receive royalties from the use of his song in the movie.

People took to Twitter to post their opinions about the film. One user tweeted, “#JokerMovie was the most brutal, uncomfortable and tense movie experience I’ve had in a long time. Joaquin Phoenix is chilling. The film was spot on and did everything it should have for a character like the Joker.”

Another user tweeted, “Outstandingly Disturbing. Prolific. Necessary Blessing to Modern Cinema.”

As much as I enjoyed the film’s premise, production, and Phoenix’s performance, I do think there are some troubling themes that need to be brought up. Arthur often justifies his heinous actions by stating “they deserved it” and using the defense that society treats “people like him” like “trash” so, they should all die. He feeds into the “Kill The Rich” movement that he involuntarily created in the subway when he committed what we presume to be his first murder(s).

Though I know the concept behind the Joker character, I can see how this can be construed as glorifying gun violence. However, we can’t have the Gotham supervillain without violence and guns. It’s an accurate representation of the character, and it’s unfortunate that it parallels a lot of what’s going on in the world today.

The Joker is also painted to incite pity within viewers, which a lot of times, it does --- or at least attempts to. This is classic Joker behavior. In Paul Dini and Bruce Timm’s comic Mad Love, readers meet Dr. Harleen Quinzel, a psychiatrist at Arkham Asylum. She gets assigned to none other than --- you guessed it --- the Joker. Though this woman is highly educated (we won’t talk about the things she did to get that education), the Joker still manipulates her and convinces her to not only help him escape Arkham, but become his partner-in-crime as well; Harleen Quinzel is no more and Harley Quinn is born.

She pities him and his situation, and he spins his tale of woe so expertly that she has the wool pulled over her eyes. Throughout the comic --- and the general timeline for Joker and Harley --- Joker mercilessly abuses Harley, from pushing her out a window to not noticing she was gone for six months. He is a cruel, manipulative psychopath that nobody should follow in the footsteps of; however, he’s good at his job, and Joker showcases that, however controversial and uncomfortable it may be.

Joker is rated R for a reason; not only are there a few F-bombs, the violence is staggering. However, when dealing with a character that is known for inciting violence and not caring about the consequences, tough scenes are necessary. Phillips didn’t shy away from blood and intensity in his murder scenes, and Phoenix went all in when it came to brutality. Personally, (spoiler!) I never really wanted to see Robert De Niro’s brains blown out the back of his skull, but you can’t have the Joker without some blood.

And finally, while the troubled citizens looking for a leader are terrorizing Gotham following Arthur’s murder of Murray Franklin (Robert De Niro) on live television, our hero’s story starts. Thomas and Martha Wayne are gunned down in an alley outside a theatre by a rogue thug and Joker fan, and young Bruce Wayne begins his famous story.

Joker was original in concept and plot, but had just enough callbacks to the comics to make it permissible. The atmosphere in the full theatre I was in was palpable. There were chuckles and titters here and there when Arthur would make a funny joke, or everyone was just laughing off the tension of the moment. There were also audible gasps and groans when things got especially rough (such as the aforementioned Robert De Niro scene). Joker did exactly what the real Joker would have wanted: it incited a reaction out of people.

I had low expectations going into the movie because, as someone who grew up reading Batman and loving to hate the Joker, I was afraid my favorite complex villain was going to get ruined (looking at you, Jared Leto). I was pleasantly surprised by Phoenix’s performance and Phillips’ take on Mista J, and it was a refreshing performance that was a polar opposite from the late Heath Ledger’s, but equally as convincing and chilling.

An Oscar seems to be on the horizon for both Phillips and Phoenix for Joker. The film is raunchy and tense, and I didn’t know I could hold my breath for two hours. It’s exactly what a Joker movie should be, and I’d encourage anyone to go watch it.

#joker #the joker #joker movie #review #joker review #comic book #comic book review #movie #dc #dc comics #todd phillips #joaquin phoenix #pop culture

1 note · View note

preciousmetals0 · 6 years ago

Text

Microsoft Revives Nonfungible Tokens, Sparks Industry’s Imagination

Microsoft Revives Nonfungible Tokens, Sparks Industry’s Imagination:

Ever since the game CryptoKitties was released in November 2017, the concept of nonfungible token has been ingrained in the minds of developers and investors in the crypto community. However, 2019 has been the year that NFTs have gained mainstream attention. And it should come as no surprise that even huge, multinational companies are currently developing NFT projects.

Recently, Mirosoft’s blockchain-based cloud platform, Azure, released its own nonfungible tokens program called “Azure Heroes” with the aim of rewarding its developer community.

Azure Heroes

Through Azure Heroes, Microsoft is on a mission to empower technical practitioners of all backgrounds. With that as the objective, it has created a tool to inspire the community to learn, coach and build on Azure while promoting healthy and inclusive behavior.

Issuance and transactions of “Badger” collectibles will be carried out on the Ethereum network, allowing winners to hold them as NFTs. The tokens were created in partnership with Enjin, a platfor that specifically caters to the video game industry.

In order to earn one of these Badgers, Azure developers must first be nominated — either by themselves or by the community. Then, the community moderators will select the best nominees, based on their performance, to be awarded a Badger. Winners will then be provided with a QR code that can be used to redeem their Badgers via their Enjin wallet, where it can then be transferred to any other NFT-compatible Ethereum address.

The rise of NFTs

Fungibility refers to an item that is interchangeable with another, identical item. A dollar bill or a grain of rice is fungible — i.e., mutually interchangeable with other dollar bills or grains of rice. On the other hand, a house or a piece of art constitutes a nonfungible item — i.e., not mutually interchangeable with other houses or other works of art. Keeping this distinction in mind, an NFT is a unique digital asset with a traceable history that differentiates it from other assets that appear similar.

One of the most interesting things about NFTs is their ability to fundamentally change digital ownership. Until now, people never truly had ownership of anything that they purchased virtually. Purchasing in-game items and treating them as real-world assets is one thing, but the reality is that they don’t belong to the players who made the purchase; they belong to the game’s publishers.

However, 2019 was the tipping point for the adoption of NFTs, and there are a few reasons for this — at least in the gaming community. First of all, games like Gods Unchained were game changers upon their release.

Developed by Australia-based blockchain gaming startup Immutable, Gods Unchained is a turn-based digital trading card game that operates on the Ethereum blockchain. There are other collectible games — such as Decentraland, Etherbots, Spells of Genesis and Rare Pepe — whose popularity rose in 2019. However, outside of the gaming industry, companies utilizing NFTs, such as SuperRare, Zcrafty and Terra0, have also gained prominence.

Marketplaces like OpenSea, RareBits and OpenBazaar have also started to trade NFTs as crypto collectibles. The infrastructure around NFTs is also improving. 0xcert offers developer tools for issuing and managing NFTs. In addition, Codex Protocol has developed a decentralized registry for unique assets like art, fine wine, antiques and more.

Moreover, there are other factors for why NFTs are becoming more popular, one of them being an interest of multinational corporations in blockchain gaming. In September 2018, one of the biggest names in gaming, Ubisoft, sponsored the Blockchain Game Summit in Lyon, France. The following month saw Ubisoft become an inaugural member of Blockchain Game Alliance. When asked about the current use of NFTs in popular products and services, Ethan Pierse, the director at the CryptoAssets Institute, told Cointelegraph:

“Indiegogo and GoFundMe have also shown that people are willing to spend plenty of money supporting causes and products that they believe in. On Indiegogo, the product you get is called a Perk, and on Kickstarter, it is a reward, and people have contributed billions to those crowdfunded projects.”

Pierse went on to add that brand loyalty and self-identification are likely to intensify further, as supporters are also able to show off digital collectibles, concluding that:

“If those tokenized collectibles also have value as an asset to encourage hodling and trading, then we are looking at a digital version of the same craziness seen with Beanie Babies or Magic: The Gathering cards. A $90000 Magic card was just tokenized for 124 investors on collectible assets platform Mythic Markets.”

Diversification of use cases of NFTs

There is a noticeable drive for the development of NFT use cases beyond entertainment. Specifically with the case multi-layer blockchains, the foundational layer — which is the home of assets such as Bitcoin — is increasingly shifting toward being a store of value, presenting a segment of the market in which high-value NFTs can develop.

NFTs can signify ownership of high-value or sensitive physical, illiquid assets such as artwork or real estate. The latter is especially an area that can profit from the use of NFTs. Additionally, there is a drive to use tokenization and fractional ownership to make these investments liquid. For instance, NFTs can represent individual units in a property owned by multiple families.

Even though many look at NFTs as a way of building new financial assets and democratizing access to capital, regulation is likely to act as a hindrance. For example, the NFT platform Codex Protocol aspires to use NFTs as a medium to fractionalize ownership of a piece of art. While this is interesting in theory, there is a risk that doing so would turn these tokenized assets into securities, which would then need to be regulated as such.

Jonathan Brandt, the principal information technology consultant at the Willow Group who designed a course on blockchain at Minnesota State University, told Cointelegraph:

“I believe a major obstacle to the adoption of NFTs for more serious purposes, say, the provenance of antiquities or the tracking of a medical supply chain, is the lack of intuitive or obvious methods for redress and recovery. Ironically, many of the centralized institutions which blockchain stands to dismantle are really good at this. Microsoft, like it or not, has achieved tremendous mass-adoption of Internet Explorer, Windows, and the Office suite. It has the reach and the gravitas to nurture acceptance of NFTs.”

How NFTs can create value for an enterprise

Essentially, the evolution of NFTs is heavily dependent on the underlying blockchain infrastructure. Optimizing for scalability and transaction speeds, for example, is anticipated to have a huge impact on the rate of development for the space. Besides this, the absence of accessibility when it comes to NFTs is a real problem that has yet to be solved, and the entry of big players like Microsoft can go a long way to help.

Enterprises can use NFTs for inventory management, where certain tokens can be combined with other tokens to represent an assembled product with multiple component parts. Another area where NFTs can find application in enterprises such as Microsoft is in licensing software.

Such licenses have been traditionally represented by keys, but NFTs stored in wallets can now be used to grant permissions. Real estate is another example of a unique asset that can potentially be represented as NFTs. Additionally, identity management — both in social media and in enterprises — can leverage nontransferable NFTs.

Microsoft and blockchain

Through Azure, Microsoft has made many pioneering efforts toward blockchain adoption. Over the course of 2018, it has launched a blockchain development kit and the Azure Blockchain Workbench.

In May 2019, the company also unveiled the Azure Blockchain Services, which is a fully managed service that allows for the formation, management and governance of consortium blockchain networks.

Related: Crypto Firms Join Azure as Microsoft Fights Amazon for Market Share

Along with these products, the company has launched an extension to Visual Studio Code to help developers create and compile smart contracts based on Ethereum, and then deploy them on the public chain or on a consortium network in the Azure Blockchain Service. Regarding this, Pierse, the CryptoAssets Institute’s director, said:

“Azure is locked in a battle to differentiate itself with AWS, Oracle, and Heroku among others. If nothing else, this creates visibility and further engages Azure’s existing communities. I’m not sure that CTOs that have committed to other development platforms are going to make strategic decisions based on which ‘badger’ they can get, but I do think this could further showcase the engagement of Azure’s developer community.”

Soon after the announcement of Azure Heroes, Microsoft also unveiled new tokenization and blockchain data management services, highlighting the increased adoption of blockchain in enterprises.

1 note · View note

goldira01 · 6 years ago

Link

Recently, Mirosoft’s blockchain-based cloud platform, Azure, released its own nonfungible tokens program called “Azure Heroes” with the aim of rewarding its developer community.

Azure Heroes

The rise of NFTs

Pierse went on to add that brand loyalty and self-identification are likely to intensify further, as supporters are also able to show off digital collectibles, concluding that:

Diversification of use cases of NFTs

Jonathan Brandt, the principal information technology consultant at the Willow Group who designed a course on blockchain at Minnesota State University, told Cointelegraph:

How NFTs can create value for an enterprise

Microsoft and blockchain

Through Azure, Microsoft has made many pioneering efforts toward blockchain adoption. Over the course of 2018, it has launched a blockchain development kit and the Azure Blockchain Workbench.

In May 2019, the company also unveiled the Azure Blockchain Services, which is a fully managed service that allows for the formation, management and governance of consortium blockchain networks.

Related: Crypto Firms Join Azure as Microsoft Fights Amazon for Market Share

Soon after the announcement of Azure Heroes, Microsoft also unveiled new tokenization and blockchain data management services, highlighting the increased adoption of blockchain in enterprises.

#Timor Invest

0 notes

wbwest · 8 years ago

Text

New Post has been published on WilliamBruceWest.com

New Post has been published on http://www.williambrucewest.com/2017/02/10/west-week-ever-pop-culture-review-21017/

West Week Ever: Pop Culture In Review - 2/10/17

Last night, my friend Mike and I went to check out The Lego Batman Movie. Seeing as how we were the only two people in the theater, I’m not quite sure what its weekend box office is gonna look like. I bet John Wick: Chapter 2 takes #1, since that’s where everyone seemed to be heading. Anyway, I LOVED the film. First up, it considers EVERYTHING canon. If you saw it onscreen, then it happened in that universe. The whole thing is kind of surreal, as the movie focuses on Batman’s loner status, while also confronting his complicated relationship with The Joker. On the Batman Beyond cartoon, there’s an episode where old Bruce Wayne and his protege, Terry McGinnis, go to a Batman-themed musical. Bruce can’t get over how goofy the whole thing seems, but I feel like this film is the movie version of that musical. It doesn’t have the camp of the ’66 show, but it’s a movie that never really takes itself seriously. I loved the liberties they took, like making Jim and Barbara Gordon people of color (voiced by Hector Elizondo and Rosario Dawson). It doesn’t hurt the story any, while bringing some diversity to the Lego world. I also liked how it tied in concepts from The Lego Movie, such as the fact that Batman is a Master Builder. I’m not going to spoil the movie for you, but I feel like it’s strong until the middle of the second act, at which point it switches from a Lego Batman movie to a Lego Dimensions movie. Trust me, you’ll understand when you see it, and I think you’ll agree that the story gets a bit weaker at that point. In any case, I can’t wait for it to hit Blu Ray, so I can rewatch it a thousand times to catch all the Easter eggs.

This week, we got a trailer for a new season of Arrow. Wait, what? That was actually for Iron Fist? Huh. Yeah, I was really underwhelmed by that trailer. Finn Jones doesn’t seem like a great actor, there’s not a lot of Kung Fu on display, and it seems like it’s more focused on corporate takeover, as Danny Rand tries to reclaim his family’s business. Since it’s a Netflix Marvel show, there’s also Rosario Dawson and another damn hallway fight. I welcome the former, but I’m SO over the latter. I’ll get around to watching it, but the days of me binge-watching a Marvel season the weekend of its release are long gone. Considering I still need to watch Daredevil season 2 and Luke Cage, I’ll be lucky to get around to it in 2017. That said, I know a lot of y’all will binge it that day, and will tell me if it sucks or not.

In other TV news, it’s rumored that NBC wants to spin Saturday Night Live‘s Weekend Update segment into a weekly 30-minute show. I guess they looked at John Oliver and Samantha Bee, and realized they might be leaving money on the table. Still, Jost and Che as “polarizing”, at best, and I’m not sure if that segment has the legs to air 30 minutes every week, in the same format. Plus, would it also remain a part of SNL, or would it be excised completely? I think this would’ve been a good idea in an election year, as there’s just so much news to cover, but now that all that is behind us, I’m just not sure this is going to work. And then what happens? If it does leave SNL, would it come crawling back next season, with its tail between its legs? The difference between Last Week Tonight/Full Frontal and Weekend Update is that those cable shows are actually smart, with smart hosts. Plus, they can get away with a bit more because cable. Weekend Update has gotten a lot more biting since Trump was elected, but is it too little, too late? Are the SNL writers up to the task of this project? I just feel like it’s a bad idea that will dilute the Weekend Update and SNL brands.

It was also announced that Viacom will be rebranding Spike TV as the Paramount Network. In my lifetime, I don’t think I’ve witnessed a network go through as many format changes as that one. As far back as I can remember, it was The Nashville Network. Then, to appeal to a wider audience, it became The National Network. Then, to appeal to dudebros, it became Spike TV. Now, I don’t even know who they’re targeting. I also don’t know why they chose this particular name. It’s like they have short memories or something. After all, there’s already been a Paramount Network. Sure, most of us referred to it as UPN and not the United Paramount Network, but that’s what those letters stood for. And it was the definition of “failed experiment”. Sure, it hobbled along for about 10 years, but its legacy is basically Star Trek: Voyager, America’s Next Top Model and Girlfriends. Outside of that, it gave us such critical darlings as Shasta McNasty, Homeboys In Outer Space, and The Secret Diary of Desmond Pfeiffer. Hey, let’s see how many shitty (that means all of them) UPN shows I can list without looking them up: DiResta, Legend, Platypus Man, Hitz, Good News, Sparks, Dilbert, Marker, The Watcher, The Sentinel…yeah,that’s enough to make my point, which is you probably don’t remember any of these. UPN did NOTHING for the Paramount brand, and its effects are still being felt 11 years after its demise. So why, WHY would Viacom want to go down this road again? Anyway, the early plans for the rebranding call for the network to be a warehouse for hit Viacom programming from their other networks. It’s basically just gonna be the Now That’s What I Call Viacom Channel, posting the highlights from MTV, Nick, Nick Jr, etc. In fact, there are no concrete plans for the future of other Viacom networks, such as VH1, CMT, and TVLand, but reports say that there’s no immediate push to shut them down.

It was also rumored that there are already talks of an American Idol revival, but this time on NBC. Now, keep in mind the show just ended its run on Fox last year. The idea is that The Voice would be reduced to one cycle a year, and then they would slot Idol in one of its old slots. I feel like NBC sees the value in that show in that it actually creates household names – something The Voice has failed to do after 11 seasons. The focus is too much on the judges, and the winners have gone nowhere. Quick, name a winner of The Voice without looking it up. Hell, I watched the first season, and I can’t even remember that guy (I looked it up: Javier Colon. Who? Right). So, there’s definitely something to be gained from acquiring the franchise. That said, though, I also feel like a network only gets one of those shows. Fox had Idol, NBC had The Voice, ABC had Rising Star, and CBS had some show that got canceled that I forgot. Fox hurt Idol by double-dipping and picking up The X-Factor. That show never caught on in the US, and it hurt the Fox singing competition brand. If NBC picks up Idol, it’s going to do the same to The Voice. I mean, how much longer does America want to see Blake Shelton and Adam Levine bicker at each other? Sure, there’s a new dynamic now that Blake and Gwen Stefani are dating and both judges, but unless the show breaks them up, I don’t know how engaging that’s gonna be. And Miley Cyrus as a coach? Now, let me say that Bangerz was a great album. I’ve written about how awesome it was. But I don’t think Miley is established enough as a singer to be coaching anyone. She’s more known for her antics than her music. Then again, Paula Abdul was a has been, judging the talent of tomorrow, but that was intrinsic to the formula. Ultimately, America chose the Idol, and the show brought in established stars as coaches. The Voice has an unnecessary layer. They have talented judges, but then they also have the coaches, and then America. As Idol showed us, ANYBODY cane a judge, which is going to be an important thing for NBC to remember once it comes to for contracts to be renegotiated. Anyway, I think Idol needs to rest a few more years before they dust it off. It was once a powerhouse, but television AND music changed over time. Let the industry figure out its next steps before trying to reenter it.

I don’t know about you, but I grew up with women, which meant I did a tour of duty with soap operas. I started with Days of Our Lives back in the late 80s, then shifted to The Young and the Restless, and then shifted back to Days in the 00s. And besides Victor Newman, there is no soap villain quite as diabolical as Stefano DiMera. Well, the actor who portrayed him, Joseph Mascolo, died back in December, but his final filmed episode aired yesterday. Although Mascolo had been battling Alzheimers for the past few years, he had portrayed the character for around 30 years. For some reason (I haven’t watched in a while), he was in prison (he’s killed/led to the death of a lot of folks. But they typically come back after contract negotiations), and at the end of the episode, he escapes! What a beautiful ending, knowing that he will be forever “in the wind”, as they can’t really catch him again unless they recast him. Seeing as how the rumor is Days is coming to an end this year, they won’t even have time to do that, with scripts written about 6 months in advance. So, here’s a toast to one of the greatest villains to ever grace the television set. You will be missed, you evil son of a bitch.

Let’s get a little controversial, shall we? This week, comedian George Lopez got in hot water for kicking a woman out of one of his shows when she objected to a racially-charged joke he told. Basically he said, “There are only two rules in the Latino family: Don’t marry somebody black and don’t park in front of our house.” Apparently, a woman gave him the finger after that joke, to which he began to tell her to “sit [her] fucking ass down or get the fuck out.” Now, comedians are on his side because they say he was just shutting down a heckler. Meanwhile, the general public is on her side because they’re offended by the joke, and don’t see why he had to kick her out for objecting. Here’s my take: First of all, he’s told variations of this joke for years. He used to joke about how his grandmother wouldn’t even want President Obama in her house. If you’re familiar with his material, then his joke the other night shouldn’t surprise you. Now, for the folks offended by the joke: was he wrong? All I know is my own life experience. I dated a Cuban, and as polite and Ivy League-educated as I could be, I was still the Black guy who could only illicit grunts from her father. And I don’t know anyone named Esmeralda Jenkins or Manuela Johnson. Growing up where I did, Black guys didn’t get Latinas or Asian girls. Those girls’ families weren’t gonna stand for that! So, this is one of those jokes that’s grounded in truth. It might rub some folks the wrong way, but it’s not necessarily untrue. Where I stand, I don’t think he really did anything wrong. After all, that’s how comedians handle folks who they feel are interrupting their show, and the joke itself was par for the Lopez course. I wouldn’t say it was “haha funny”, but it wasn’t wrong.

Things You Might Have Missed This Week

An animated series based on the Castlevania video game is coming to Netflix later this year. Hopefully it will star gay Simon Belmont from Captain N: The Game Master.

Kate McKinnon will voice Ms. Frizzle in Netflix’s reboot of The Magic School Bus

Speaking of Netflix, Love, The OA, and Trollhunters have all been renewed by the streaming service.

Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, announced that she’s retiring after her next album is released.

After 25 years over covering the Olympics, Bob Costas announced he’s handing the reins over to Mike Tirico

Entertainment newsmagazine show The Insider has been canceled after 13 seasons.

Formerly of USA’s Satisfaction, Blair Redford has been cast as the first mutant in Fox’s X-Men TV series

Not to be outdone by Beyoncé, it was announced that George and Amal Clooney are expecting twins. Those Hollywood In Vitro clinics are working overtime these days!

Speaking of babies, Jason Statham proved he’s the Transporter of Sperm, as he announced he’s expecting a baby with girlfriend Rosie Huntington-Whiteley

I don’t like Tom Brady. Don’t like a thing about him. I find it odd that you can be suspended for cheating AND win the Super Bowl in the same damn season. That said, that was a Hell of a comeback during Sunday’s Super Bowl LI. Somehow, the Atlanta Falcons blew a 25-point lead, allowing the New England Patriots to mount an amazing comeback and win their 5th Super Bowl title. It was the first Super Bowl to go into overtime. There was Edelman’s amazing catch. Some are calling it the most exciting game of football ever. But in the end there can only be one winner, and that was the Patriots. So, with that in mind, the New England Patriots had the West Week Ever.

#80s #Batman #DC #Marvel #Movies #Music #Politics #Race #Star Trek #Television #Toys #Video Games #West Week Ever #X-Men

1 note · View note

aklsupporter · 4 years ago

Text

The 'Unix Way'

It probably shouldn't, but it routinely astonishes me how much we live on the Web. Even I find myself going entire boots without using anything but the Web browser. With such an emphasis on Web-based services, one can forget to appreciate the humble operating system.

That said, we neglect our OS at the risk of radically underutilizing the incredible tools that it enables our device to be.

Most of us only come into contact with one, or possibly both, of two families of operating systems: "House Windows" and "House Practically Everything Else." The latter is more commonly known as Unix.

Windows has made great strides in usability and security, but to me it can never come close to Unix and its progeny. Though more than 50 years old, Unix has a simplicity, elegance, and versatility that is unrivalled in any other breed of OS.

This column is my exegesis of the Unix elements I personally find most significant. Doctors of computer science will concede the immense difficulty of encapsulating just what makes Unix special. So I, as decidedly less learned, will certainly not be able to come close. My hope, though, is that expressing my admiration for Unix might spark your own.

The Root of the Family Tree

If you haven't heard of Unix, that's only because its descendants don't all have the same resemblance to it -- and definitely don't share a name. MacOS is a distant offshoot which, while arguably the least like its forebears, still embodies enough rudimentary Unix traits to trace a clear lineage.

The three main branches of BSD, notably FreeBSD, have hewn the closest to the Unix formula, and continue to form the backbone of some of the world's most important computing systems. A good chunk of the world's servers, computerized military hardware, and PlayStation consoles are all some type of BSD under the hood.

Finally, there's Linux. While it hasn't preserved its Unix heritage as purely as BSD, Linux is the most prolific and visible Unix torchbearer. A plurality, if not outright majority, of the world's servers are Linux. On top of that, almost all embedded devices run Linux, including Android mobile devices.

Where Did This Indispensable OS Come From?

To give as condensed a history lesson as possible, Unix was created by an assemblage of the finest minds in computer science at Bell Labs in 1970. In their task, they set themselves simple objectives. First, they wanted an OS that could smoothly run on whatever hardware they could find since, ironically, they had a hard time finding any computers to work with at Bell. They also wanted their OS to allow multiple users to log in and run programs concurrently without bumping into each other. Finally, they wanted the OS to be simple to administer and intuitively organized. After acquiring devices from the neighboring department, which had a surplus, the team eventually created Unix.

Unix was adopted initially, and vigorously so, by university computer science departments for research purposes. The University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana and the University of California Berkeley led the charge, with the latter going so far as to develop its own brand of Unix called the Berkeley Software Distribution, or BSD.

Eventually, AT&T, Bell's successor, lost interest in Unix and jettisoned it in the early 90s. Shortly following this, BSD grew in popularity, and AT&T realized what a grave mistake it had made. After what is probably still the most protracted and aggressive tech industry legal battle of all time, the BSD developers won sole custody of the de facto main line of Unix. BSD has been Unix's elder statesmen ever since, and guards one of the purest living, widely available iterations of Unix.

Organizational Structure

My conception of Unix and its accompanying overall approach to computing is what I call the "Unix Way." It is the intersection of Unix structure and Unix philosophy.

To begin with the structural side of the equation, let's consider the filesystem. The design is a tree, with every file starting at the root and branching from there. It's just that the "tree" is inverted, with the root at the top. Every file has its proper relation to "/" (the forward slash notation called "root"). The whole of the system is contained in the directories found here. Within each directory, you can have a practically unlimited number of files or other directories, each of which can have an unlimited number of files and directories of its own, and so on.

More importantly, every directory under root has a specific purpose. I covered this a while back in a piece on the Filesystem Hierarchy Standard, so I won't rehash it all here. But to give a few illustrative examples, the /boot directory stores everything your system needs to boot up. The /bin, /sbin, and /usr directories retain all your system binaries (the things that run programs). Configuration files that can alter how system-owned programs work live in /etc. All your personal files such as documents and media go in /home (to be more accurate, in your user account's directory in /home). The kind of data that changes all the time, namely logs, gets filed under /var.

In this way, Unix really lives by the old adage "a place for everything, and everything in its place." This is exactly why it's very easy to find whatever you're looking for. Most of the time, you can follow the tree one directory at a time to get to exactly what you need, simply by picking the directory whose name seems like the most appropriate place for your file to be. If that doesn't work, you can run commands like 'find' to dig up exactly what you're looking for. This organizational scheme also keeps clutter to a minimum. Things that are out-of-place stand out, at which point they can be moved or deleted.

Everything Is a File

Another convention which lends utility through elegance is the fact that everything in Unix is a file. Instead of creating another distinct digital structure for things like hardware and processes, Unix thinks of all of these as files. They may not all be files as we commonly understand them, but they are files in the computer science sense of being groups of bits.

This uniformity means that you are free to use a variety of tools for dealing with anything on your system that needs it. Documents and media files are files. Obvious as that sounds, it means they are treated like individual objects that can be referred to by other programs, whether according to their content format, metadata, or raw bit makeup.

Devices are files in Unix, too. No matter what hardware you connect to your system, it gets classified as a block device or a stream device. Users almost never mess with these devices in their file form, but the computer needs a way of classifying these devices so it knows how to interact with them. In most cases, the system invokes some program for converting the device "file" into an immediately usable form.

Block devices represent blocks of data. While block devices aren't treated like "files" in their entirety, the system can read segments of the block device by requesting a block number. Stream devices, on the other hand, are "files" that present streams of information, meaning bits that are being created or sent constantly by some process. A good example is a keyboard: it sends a stream of data as keys are pressed.

Even processes are files. Every program that you run spawns one or more processes that persist as long as the program does. Processes regularly start other processes, but can all be tracked by their unique process ID (PID) and grouped by the user that owns them. By classifying processes as files, locating and manipulating them is straightforward. This is what makes reprioritizing selfish processes or killing unruly ones possible.

To stray a bit into the weeds, you can witness the power of construing everything as a file by running the 'lsof' command. Short for "list open files," 'lsof' enumerates all files currently in use which fit certain criteria. Example criteria include whether or not the files use system network connections, or which process owns them.

Virtues of Openness

The last element I want to point out (though certainly not the last that wins my admiration) is Unix's open computing standard. Most, if not all, of the leading Unix projects are open source, which means they are accessible. This has several key implications.

First, anyone can learn from it. In fact, Linux was born out of a desire to learn and experiment with Unix. Linus Torvalds wanted a copy of Minix to study and modify, but its developers did not want to hand out its source code. In response, Torvalds simply made his own Unix kernel, Linux. He later published the kernel on the Internet for anyone else who also wanted to play with Unix. Suffice it to say that there was some degree of interest in his work.

Second, Unix's openness means anyone can deploy it. If you have a project that requires a computer, Unix can power it; and being highly adaptable due to its architecture, this makes it great for practically any application, from tinkering to running a global business.

Third, anyone can extend it. Again, due to its open-source model, anyone can take a Unix OS and run with it. Users are free to fork their own versions, as happens routinely with Linux distributions. More commonly, users can easily build their own software that runs on any type of Unix system.

This portability is all the more valuable by virtue of Unix and its derivatives running on more hardware than any other OS type. Linux alone can run on essentially all desktop or laptop devices, essentially all embedded devices including mobile devices, all server devices, and even supercomputers.

So, I wouldn't say there's nothing Unix can't do, but you'd be hard-pressed to find it.

A School of Thought, and Class Is in Session

Considering the formidable undertaking that is writing an OS, most OS developers focus their work by defining a philosophy to underpin it. None has become so iconic and influential as the Unix philosophy. Its impact has reached beyond Unix to inspire generations of computer scientists and programmers.

There are multiple formulations of the Unix philosophy, so I will outline what I take as its core tenets.

In Unix, every tool should do one thing, but do that thing well. That sounds intuitive enough, but enough programs weren't (and still aren't) designed that way. What this precept means in practice is that each tool should be built to address only one narrow slice of computing tasks, but that it should also do so in a way that is simple to use and configurable enough to adapt to user preferences regarding that computing slice.

Once a few tools are built along these philosophical lines, users should be able to use them in combination to accomplish a lot (more on that in a sec). The "classic" Unix commands can do practically everything a fundamentally useful computer should be able to do.

With only a few dozen tools, users can:

Manage processes

Manipulate files and their contents irrespective of filetype

Configure hardware and networking devices

Manage installed software

Write and compile code into working binaries

Another central teaching of Unix philosophy is that tools should not assume or impose expectations for how users will use their outputs or outcomes. This concept seems abstract, but is intended to achieve the very pragmatic benefit of ensuring that tools can be chained together. This only amplifies what the potent basic Unix toolset is capable of.

In actual practice, this allows the output of one command to be the input of another. Remember that I said that everything is a file? Program outputs are no exception. So, any command that would normally require a file can alternatively take the "file" that is the previous command's output.

Lastly, to highlight a lesser-known aspect of Unix, it privileges text handling and manipulation. The reason for this is simple enough: text is what humans understand. It is therefore what we want computational results delivered in.

Fundamentally, all computers truly do is transform some text into different text (by way of binary so that it can make sense of the text). Unix tools, then, should let users edit, substitute, format, and reorient text with no fuss whatsoever. At the same time, Unix text tools should never deny the user granular control.

In observing the foregoing dogmas, text manipulation is divided into separate tools. These include the likes of 'awk', 'sed', 'grep', 'sort', 'tr', 'uniq', and a host of others. Here, too, each is formidable on its own, but immensely powerful in concert.

True Power Comes From Within

Regardless of how fascinating you may find them, it is understandable if these architectural and ideological distinctions seem abstruse. But whether or not you use your computer in a way that is congruent with these ideals, the people who designed your computer's OS and applications definitely did. These developers, and the pioneers before them, used the mighty tools of Unix to craft the computing experience you enjoy every day.

Nor are these implements relegated to some digital workbench in Silicon Valley. All of them are there -- sitting on your system anytime you want to access them -- and you may have more occasion to use them than you think. The majority of problems you could want your computer to solve aren't new, so there are usually old tools that already solve them. If you find yourself performing a repetitive task on a computer, there is probably a tool that accomplishes this for you, and it probably owes its existence to Unix.

In my time writing about technology, I have covered some of these tools, and I will likely cover yet more in time. Until then, if you have found the "Unix Way" as compelling as I have, I encourage you to seek out knowledge of it for yourself. The Internet has no shortage of this, I assure you. That's where I got it.

0 notes

andreabonadeo-blog · 6 years ago

Text

Final Blog Reflection

The last few months, for me, have been a whirlwind. Before coming to Sheridan College, I had been stuck in “ambiguity land” for a long time (Barnwell, 2019). I didn’t know what career I wanted to pursue after graduation, so I ended up working in a position that I did not particularly enjoy. The decision to apply to Sheridan College came not from being called in a particular direction, but rather what was pressing at the time. In my previous position as Payroll Assistant, there was no challenge or stimulation. I was doing the same thing every week and knew that there had to be something better for me outside of that organization. I had faith that this program would help me figure out what career I wanted to pursue and help jumpstart my career upon graduation.

When applying for the Project Management Post Graduate Certificate at Sheridan College, I expected to take very technical course that shaped me to be an effective manager. At the time I had no idea what it truly meant to be a manager. What I quickly learned as a result of the Leadership Development Course was that it was not just my managerial skills that I had hoped to improve, but also my leadership skills. My idea of a good manager at the beginning of September was, in hindsight, very superficial. I soon realized the importance of leadership not only in a managerial role, but in my professional and personal life as well.

Using the weekly blog postings, I have been frequently self-reflecting. This self-reflection facilitated the application of my learning from the course to my past, present, and future experiences. Looking back on my experience writing the blog postings, I realize how much easier it became to write them week after week. I remember struggling to write the first few blogs and not entirely understanding what was expected of me. Beyond that, my main concern at the time was writing about things that my professor would find relevant. It wasn’t until mid-way through the course that I realized that any part of my journey, or my leadership story, was relevant. The more I learned in class and the deeper my understanding of leadership became, the easier it was for me to answer the blog questions and relate my experiences to the course. Additionally, the underlying concepts of class activities became clearer as this semester progressed. Every class became more interesting and more exciting to be a part of than the last.

In the past few months I have learned a lot about myself and have significantly grown as an individual. I noticed myself becoming more extroverted as I became comfortable with my colleagues and actively tried to become a better leader. In my opinion, there are many required elements to be a good leader. During our second week in the Leadership Development course, we learned about authentic leadership and what it takes to be a leader. This was one of my favourite lessons because we learned so much about our strengths and about each other. It was during this lecture that we assessed our personalities and strengths, and this exercise really resonated with me. My biggest takeaway from these exercises was that I need to focus on improving my strengths as opposed to focusing on my weaknesses and areas of improvement. If I strengthen my current leadership skills, I will naturally become a better, more authentic leader. During week two we also wrote a leadership credo, which I felt was a great exercise to better understand myself and what I value. In truth, I had never thought about what it was that I stood for as a leader prior to that lesson, and I am glad that I had the opportunity to learn more about myself as a result of this lecture.

It was during this lesson as well that we were introduced to different management styles. As I wrote blog post three, I was able to explore this concept and identify how my management style, at the time, was very accommodating. While re-reading my blog postings in order to reflect on this semester, I noticed the realization that my management style had shifted to a collaborative one without my knowing in blog post six. This is a direct example of my personal growth throughout this course, but I have grown in more subtle ways as well.

In my week one and week eight blogs I directly discuss confidence, which is something I have struggled with for the past few years. I have seen small changes in my level of confidence throughout this semester, such as speaking more in class, becoming more comfortable public speaking, and by expressing my ideas with more conviction in group-work situations. While my confidence has not grown exponentially, I am still proud of the progress that I have made thus far. Most importantly, I have gained awareness of my confidence issues, which means that I can now actively work towards improvement, while strengthening my other strengths, in the future.

During week nine, I had the opportunity to receive feedback from my classmates. This was an eye-opening experience, as they helped me see myself from a different perspective. They reminded me of my strengths and the need to focus on improving them specifically and assured me that I had made the right choice applying to the Project Management program at Sheridan College. Throughout the entirety of this course I have learned the importance of team development and what it takes to be a good and reliable team member. I now realize the importance of developing personal and professional connections with my team members and I am lucky to have done so with some of my classmates in the past three months. If not for this course, I would not have gotten so close with some of the other students. I am now part of a strong network of future business professionals and, more importantly, a new group of friends.

A specific leadership moment of revelation, for me, was after we learned how to draw pigs in class. What started as a bizarre exercise became one of my favourite experiences from this semester. It demonstrated the idea that “enough is enough when it is enough” (Barnwell, 2019). During this exercise, I learned that ambiguity should not make me so uncomfortable and that there is a distinction between not enough, enough, and too much that I must be aware of. I thought this exercise was very fun and informative, and it was during this lecture that I realized that I had been stuck in “ambiguity land” for too long prior to attending Sheridan College (Barnwell, 2019). I am thankful to have been accepted into this program and to have taken part in the Leadership Development course. I underestimated the course on day one; I wasn’t sure what the class would entail but I have learned a lot from it and have gained invaluable experience from this class.

This program has brought some of the life back into me, giving me something to be excited about again. I love to be busy and to have a challenge, and this program has certainly proved to be a challenge at times. The Leadership Development course helped me realize that, while stuck in “ambiguity land”, I had lost my leadership capabilities (Barnwell, 2019). I was bored at my job and was so focused on what I wasn’t doing, like starting my career, that I completely overlooked what I could be doing. Through the Leadership Development course, I found my leadership strengths once again and the spark that I have been missing was reignited.

Today I have a new sense of determination and motivation as a direct result of this program. The Leadership Development course has brought me out of my shell and given me the tools and understanding required to be a better friend, colleague, leader, and manager. I have re-framed my expectations of myself and have a new perspective regarding my strengths and what I can accomplish. This course has helped me grow as a person and I intend to apply my learning to my life going forward. With the learning I have gained from this course, I know I can become a more authentic leader and that I am on the right path out of “ambiguity land” and into my future (Barnwell, 2019).

References

Barnwell, K. (2019). My Personal Journey Lecture.

0 notes

ryanhsummers · 6 years ago

Text

Business Plan Presentation Post

It's kind of surreal to be at the end of the degree program. It hasn't seemed like a long dragged-out process. I think this is mostly because each course tends to keep you pretty busy. I learned a new level of time management over the last year. I think this has seemed like a longer process to my wife. She's never complained, but I've certainly taken time away from my family on the weekends. I usually tried to finish as much of my work during the week as I possibly could. I've never been one to allow others to determine my deadlines. I always tend to start assignments as soon as they're open, so I don't run into last minute problems. This also allowed me to ask the course directors questions during the week while they were still around. I'll give a run down of the courses here -

Mastery - I think the best part about the Mastery course, was Dan Spellman. He seemed like a genuinely positive and considerate person. I hear he left to go do some marketing work for Universal. I would have liked to have him in the Digital Marketing course, and I was looking forward to spending more time with him. Professor Woodward took over some of the Digital Marketing responsibilities, and he did a fine job. The Mastery course started me thinking about my goals more - within context of my career. It made me feel like I needed to do more research in general and it taught me to take on my research of my own in figuring out how I can create opportunities for myself.

Executive Leadership - Executive Leadership was an interesting course. I like the books we got for it. I'm a pretty big fan of John Maxwell. I think he has a pretty good feel for demystifying management concepts. On the other hand, I'm not much of a Robert Greene fan, unless I want to pick up some ideas about how to obliterate other people for my own gain. I know that's not the entire point of his writing, but I find his concepts to be a little more difficult to practice. I also felt some of his examples were a little bit of a stretch. This made the subjective grading of the assignments a little annoying. Overall, I took away from this course the necessity of really lifting people in management. I have always felt this way anyway, so it wasn't a challenging adjustment.

Project and Team Management - Professor Lester introduced me to project management software. I really like organizing things and creating timelines. I appreciate the free use of the software we were given while in the class. I hope the school has an opportunity to partner with another software developer at some point, because this software is a little buggy and that can be scary. I really want to run the Monday management software online, but it's pricey to spend $30mo for it, so I'm not there. I look forward to taking these legitimate concepts into my future planning work in my career and look forward to using this kind of software as well.

Business and Storytelling - I remember specifically getting into Adobe Spark for the first time and I hated it. I felt so limited. It wasn't fair to the course, but I remember trying to record voiceovers per slide rather than a narrated presentation take like we did for our final business presentation. I also spent a lot of time trying to figure out my business name. The name I settled on at the time was Orbalign. I was looking for a unique brand name I could trademark. I bought the URL and everything. Later I decided on High Harbor, but that URL was $1000, so I went with "High Harbors". It was a good exercise in brand identity and helped me discover the process for solidifying a name which allows you to reserve all of the social media channels that go with it.

Entertainment Business Finance - I thought this course would be really difficult, but I learned early on that I could find Excel formulas for everything and that made everything much more understandable. When you don't have to retain all of the math formulas, you can focus on the concepts a lot more. I think academically, the program is missing an opportunity to utilize Excel a lot more by showing students how to organize formulas for these things and creating a single document to use for reference. Instead, it becomes very intimidating to read through the book. In that course you have to watch the GoTo sessions with Chris before doing the reading. I tended to start the reading immediately. I learned I spent a lot more time worrying that way. This course forced me to lay out the math formulas for how my business plan would work. That took some time, but I like Excel and it was a real accomplishment for me. I spent more time in that course developing things than any other course. I was time well-spent.

Digital Marketing - Digital Marketing was good, but it was a little unorganized. Around this time, I also purchased a little book written by a family friend - Flint McGlaughlin from MECLABS. It's called The Marketer as Philosopher. It's all about understanding marketing from a perspective of understanding people and ultimately what it takes to cause people to click on every "call to action" to get a conversion. Since this course, I am much more critical of website design in general. I think that's a good thing. I think the less money a website has for implementing financial tools, the more calls to action they have to cycle for the buyer to purchase something. This is a detriment to conversions and revenue. I feel a good strong understanding of these things - tying in social media channels and digital retail tools together as efficiently as possible to create conversions.

Negotiation and Dealmaking - I liked this course for one simple reason. It trained me to be confrontational on purpose. I've always had an issue being confrontational, but when I understood how it is expected and you're supposed to return a better position for yourself, it made negotiation a fun concept to review. I liked this course. It also helped me save money on my car purchase a few moths ago…

Product and Artist Management - This course was good for helping me plan some personal marketing ideas for a music release I was working on. I planned a printing of a dual CD manufacturing. I also recognized that most CD printing services don't do dual CD printing any more. This was a good course for helping me understand how to create a target market and put an honest price value on goods sold. I think sometimes we find it hard to be honest about out market and what we can get.

Advanced Entertainment Law - This course gave me a good, continued understanding of contract language from the Negotiation course. It also helped me understand legitimate liabilities in my business model and how to cover for those. Starting a business is all about minimizing liabilities. My business model requires a number of legal agreements and contract templates. This helped me prepare for that process.

Entertainment Media Publishing - During the month, Professor Kim was recognized as educator of the year. This course came along right at a good time for me as I was preparing to promote a music release. I learned about the use of professional communication to reach out to publishers and music supervisors. This set my official release back because I recognized the work I needed to put into this and didn't have time for. My emails are ready to go out in a few weeks now that I'll have more time.

Business Plan Development - What can I say? My business plan is over 30 pages. This was the culmination of everything. It made the work I put in for the full degree program worth it, to finally summarize everything into this document. I feel good about my first business plan, but I also recognize that my business plans in the future will be much more cleanly developed. The first one is rarely the best one. I think I did good for my business concept though. I learned the uniqueness of my network marketing business and the challenge of pitching something so different from a typical revenue model.

Final Project Business Plan - I've enjoyed putting the finishing touches on the business plan and seeing the presentation through. In some ways, I was adjusting things right up to the last minute as Professor Bill was giving me suggestions. I don’t think a business is ever really fully developed until you get into it. I've understood the business plan is essential for documenting the process you've taken to think of as much as possible. It’s the only way to prove to investors that you're serious.

I'm proud of the process we all took and appreciate the organization of the degree. I think that due to the subject matter, this could be something that is always constantly evolving in the way the academics are organized. The process brought me through my first business plan and the presentation of it. I feel like I really know what I'm doing and know what I'm talking about. That makes it a relief to see the time I committed to it go to good use and contribute to my overall growth.

Ryan

0 notes

hub-pub-bub · 6 years ago

Link

Libraries reach non-patrons through innovative outreach

Visitors to Niquette Bay State Park in Vermont don’t expect to encounter poetry as they wander forested trails around Lake Champlain. But for the past five years, Penny Cunningham at Colchester’s Burnham Memorial Library has collaborated with the park on the Poetry Walk, an installation of 15 poems along a nearly mile-long trail. At the beginning of each month from June to October, a new series is installed. Since its inception, thousands of people have taken the Poetry Walk, and many made a trip to the library afterward, reports Cunningham.

The Poetry Walk is just one example of the ingenious ways libraries are developing to reach non-users. By bringing books, programs, and services to community members in places they already go—expanding the concept of what libraries do in the process—libraries are redefining outreach.

GETTING OUT AND MOVING

Cunningham’s initiative taps into a larger zeitgeist, also seen in the Public Library Association’s partnership with the National Network of Libraries of Medicine to promote physical activity and health literacy. Noah Lenstra, assistant professor at the Department of Library and Information Studies at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, School of Education, created Let’s Move in Libraries to track health initiatives launched by public libraries, including the Katahdin Gear Library (KGL) at the Millinocket Memorial Library (MML) in Maine.

When Matt DeLaney arrived to serve as director of MML in January 2017, it was on its last legs. The library had closed in 2015 for three months, then reopened for 15 hours a week thanks to volunteers. They raised funds to hire a director for one year—a challenge DeLaney couldn’t resist.

Now DeLaney has temporarily relocated the library while the permanent building undergoes a $1.75 million renovation. “One of the best ways we could capture the attention of the community was ... reimagining it,” says DeLaney, creator of the KGL, which lends out Nordic skis, snowshoes, canoes, kayaks, paddleboards, and mountain bikes.

The KGL, in an empty storefront downtown, is part of the library’s commitment to supporting regional economic development. The town is developing mountain bike trails but struggled to create a biking culture. DeLaney created the KGL to get local kids excited about the sport, as well as to provide equipment and skills to maintain it.

A partnership with the Outdoor Sports Institute provided equipment to get the KGL started. People can now borrow bicycles, bike racks, tools, helmets, reflective gear, storage bags, and water bottles. Since its creation in 2018, the KGL has become a hangout for local kids who work with a volunteer to refurbish donated bikes. The result is an increase in the number of library cardholders from 1,300 to 2,000 in one year, and a change in people’s understanding of the role a public library can play in transforming a community. This year, the second annual Millinocket Century Ride will raise money for the library. DeLaney, who was recognized by the Maine Library Association as its 2018 Outstanding Librarian of the Year, will prepare by running all of the mountain bike trails in Baxter State Park.

IN THE MIX (top) Gail Borden Public Library’s Veterans Voices volunteer (and Vietnam veteran) Rob Braido talks to a third/fourth grade class at Parkwood Elementary School, IL.; (bottom) Gina Rice, Customer Service Manager (l.), and Kathy Tilleman, Operations Specialist (r.), staffing a table for the 2018 Spokane Homeless Connect where they forgave library fines and signed people up for library cards. Top photo by Ben Bahl; bottom photo by Aileen Luppert

EVERYBODY LOVES A STORY

Story time is often the gateway to public libraries. However, kindling the spark can be difficult when families face trauma. Cindy Ulrey, a librarian at the Spokane County Library District, has been bringing monthly story times to the Open Doors family shelter since 2018. Ulrey arrives around 7 p.m. “The shelter is usually completely chaotic because everyone sets up their bed around that time,” she says.

Ulrey lures families to her story time with a puppet, but that’s where the similarities to traditional story time end. “It’s different every time—sometimes I have elementary students, sometimes I have teens,” reports Ulrey. “Most of the times we have parents, but sometimes it’s just the kids.” She says the key to success is flexibility, remembering one instance when a woman went into labor. “If you think of library story time, that goes out the window,” says Ulrey. “Think about if you’ve had a bad day in regular story time; multiply that by 1,000.”

Ulrey remains inspired, watching older kids read to younger peers, and seeing children make beds for felt bears after reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? Parents share favorite nursery rhymes, and Ulrey builds early literacy skills by asking open-ended questions and making connections between what happens throughout the day and at school. While she rarely has repeat attendees, when she does, they’re happy to see her. For Ulrey, the opportunity to connect with people who are not able to access traditional library services has been profound. “If we weren’t doing it as a library, I would be doing it as a volunteer,” she says.

Julie Perrin, director of the Jaffrey Public Library, NH, agrees. When she took the helm in 2017, she prioritized reaching underserved, marginalized populations, which led her to partner with the Monadnock Adult Care Center (MACC). “MACC provides respite day care for adults with physical, emotional or social challenges,” explains Perrin. “Many of their clients are memory care patients and suffer from Alzheimer’s or other forms of dementia, or Down syndrome.” What began as a simple idea to provide books at the center has morphed into a weekly Adult Story Time that the library, MACC, and clients alike eagerly anticipate.

Perrin and her assistant, Eileen Eber, have developed a program combining story time with a memory café. Each session begins with a brief book talk highlighting MACC’s rotating collection, then a reading selection to trigger memories for participants, who recite along. Perrin and Eber share humorous children’s books, highlighting illustrations, and encouraging the crowd to add sound effects. The group of 18 to 25 sits in a circle, and interaction is encouraged. When bilingual attendees began reading the French version of One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish, the language spurred memories of childhood, and several people who had never spoken began chatting with the librarians.

For Perrin and Eber, the experience has been magical. “You have an opportunity where no one’s judging what you do, and it reminds them of who they were before they had dementia.” Although many participants won’t remember the story time, MACC staff report that the library visits are a highlight for their clients. “When I’ve had a hard day at the library, and we’re going over to the Adult Day Care Center, I always come back completely rejuvenated,” says Perrin. “We really love it, and they do as well.”

Alejandra Santana, First Assistant Librarian for the Chicago Public Library STEAM Team, shares stories in a local laundromat. Photo courtesy of Chicago Public Library

LAUNDRY & LITERACY

The Chicago Public Library (CPL) has been doing outreach in laundromats for 30 years; it ramped up efforts two years ago, using its STEAM Team to bring science, technology, engineering, art, and math–based literacy programs.

“We use the laundromat as a learning lab,” says Elizabeth McChesney, director of Children’s Services and Family Engagement at the CPL. “We talk about the colors in the washing machines, and the bubbles, and how sorting is an early scientific activity, and how parents can build the skills in their children so that they’ll be successful later in life.”

The library makes weekly visits to 20 area laundromats. Establishing the initial relationships took tenacity, but they are now having an impact. McChesney reports an uptick in laundromat usage coinciding with story time. Library staff notice that parents are more comfortable singing, talking, and reading with their kids. Some take their socks and turn them into puppets—a skill modeled at story time.

To be successful in a busy, distracting environment, McChesney recommends being consistent yet flexible. Building trust with parents takes time. Sharing stories relevant to the listeners’ lives—and providing a colorful quilt for kids to sit on—encourages participation. Hundreds of families have attended sessions, McChesney says.

Smaller libraries can succeed with similar projects. Since last August, Patsy Brewer, director of the Waynesboro–Wayne County Library, MS, has given away thousands of books through her Laundry and Literacy project. Brewer arranged with four laundromat owners to place colorful laundry baskets holding bilingual books, magazines, coloring books, coloring materials, crossword puzzles, young adult novels, children’s books, and adult fiction in their facilities. Funded by a $500 Margaret Murray Literacy Grant and a matching grant from the Friends of the Library, the material is available to anyone who wants it to take home. Library staff make the rounds every two weeks to replenish items from donations, and promote library programs through flyers in the baskets.

BOOKS ABOUND

Whether visitors to the Effingham County Office Building in Illinois aim to renew a driver’s license, see an incarcerated loved one, or take care of paperwork, chances are they’ll leave with a book, thanks to a Book Box vending machine installed by the Effingham Public Library. A second Book Box has been installed at a struggling mall to help draw visitors. And when the office building underwent renovations, the Book Box moved to a grocery store, spurring an avid young reader to apply for work there. Since their 2016 launch, funded by a $3,000 grant from Better World Books, the machines have dispersed more than 10,000 free donated materials.

When new babies are born in Elgin, IL, registrars at local hospitals sign them up for library cards as part of the Welcome Baby early literacy initiative at the Gail Borden Public Library District (GBPL). Parents are invited to the library, where they receive a tote full of board books, blankets, hats, sippy cups, booties, and a onesie.

“We invite community groups to contribute,” explains Miriam Anderson Lytle, division chief of Community Services and Program Development at the library. The program debuted in 2014, and within the first nine months 250 newborns had been registered. Since then, many new parents have visited the library for the first time and left with cards.

“Recently at a Baby’s First Library Visit in Spanish, a new mom came with her mother,” says Lytle. “They had never been to the library. They happily received their baby blanket [and] tote bag, checked out a Spanish baby bundle with the baby library card, and received a tour of the Early Learning Center. She also signed up to receive parenting tips in Spanish sent to her cell phone.”

MAKING MEMORIES Julie Perrin, Jaffrey Library director (standing with mic) reads Wolves in the Walls by Neil Gaiman to the MACC clients during a weekly visit. Library Assistant Eileen Eber is seated in the background, to the left of Perrin; MACC clients to the right. Photo by Chris Selmer

MEETING COMMUNITY NEEDS

Elgin doesn’t stop with baby steps, however. More than 5,000 local students learn through GBPL’s Veterans Voices initiative. Now in its third year, the program matches veterans with school districts during the two weeks surrounding Veterans Day for conversation, learning, intergenerational connection, and community building. The library built the program on relationships forged during its 2013 Big Read, The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien. One spouse told Lytle, “I haven’t seen my husband so happy in a long time.”

Lytle cites the GBPL’s ability to organize as key, a sentiment echoed by Aileen Luppert, managing librarian at the Spokane County Library District, WA, who serves as vice chair of the Spokane Homeless Coalition and chair of the Leadership Team for the Greater Valley Support Network. When Luppert attended Homeless Connect in Spokane, a day-long event connecting people experiencing homelessness with resources, she recognized a need in Spokane Valley. “Our homelessness looks different,” says Luppert. Rather than living on the streets, families are doubled up or couch surfing. She collaborated with other agencies to organize a day when people could apply for state, food, and housing assistance; replace IDs from the Department of Motor Vehicles; work with judges from Community Court to quash warrants; get haircuts; visit a food bank; have their fines waived; and even get vaccinations for pets. The first Valley Connect event drew more than 300 people.

The library has created a low-use card for patrons who can’t provide an address, so they can access the Internet and borrow two items at a time. “People break into tears of gratitude,” reports Luppert. “We don’t always know who’s... struggling with housing. They look like everyone else.” Because working with those experiencing trauma can impact staff, she provides Ryan Dowd’s online Librarian’s Guide to Homelessness training and encourages self-care. “Changing people’s lives matters,” says Luppert. “It is such a fruitful way to make connections in your community.”

JUST FOR FUN

At Whitewater Memorial Library, KS, what began as a game of dress-up during the 2015 summer reading program has morphed into a full-blown costume collection. Director Jean Thiessen has cataloged 170 costumes for babies to adults. In a town of 716, the library circulates 60-70 costumes each year.

“We see people we’ve never seen before,” says Thiessen. “People really have fun with it... They often check out multiple costumes to put together one of their own design.”

The collection grew through garage sales and store purchases, but as word spread, the library was inundated with donations. Thiessen estimates the entire collection costs less than $500. The costumes are available year-round—even through interlibrary loan—but only displayed during Halloween. Says Thiessen, “It’s really met a need in the community.” Next up: a kite collection.

GO OUTSIDE AND PLAY

Comfortable shoes, flexibility, and willingness to meet people where they are are essential to extending the library’s reach beyond traditional audiences. Nancy Kranich, special projects research librarian at Rutgers University, says that libraries need to get over their “edifice complexes,” and recognize that institutions are more than just four walls.

“Get out of the building, because there are so many ways that we can reach other parts of our community and make a difference,” says Jaffrey’s Perrin. “Don’t be afraid—it’s completely worth it.”

#books #reading #libraries #civic services

0 notes

topicprinter · 6 years ago

Link

Matt Damon is known to tell people who ask him advice about acting that they should quit. The reason being, if you’re going to succeed in that business you’re going to be told “no” many more times than anyone will tell you “yes”. You might find more encouragement in trying to start a company, but you’re still going to face a lot of rejection, bad news, and unexpected downturns that you’ll need to overcome if you’re going to succeed.I wanted to give a case study based on my experiences, as a real example is always better than a hypothetical. My name is Sean, and I created the [Toast! gummy](toastgummy.com). Based on the latest clinical science, my gummy helps boost your body’s response to alcohol. The idea was born not, as you might guess, because I was a drinker who got hungover a lot. Instead it came about from a major illness, which was initially (as it turns out, erroneously) blamed on alcohol. I wasn’t much of a drinker so I started researching how alcohol interacts with your body, and found a number of fascinating recent studies about how that damage (not just long term, but even hangovers) could be prevented with a number of naturally occurring compounds.Enter rejection #1: I asked my doctors about the studies I was reading, and basically got blank stares in response. When I reached out to the authors of those studies, most of them ignored me. If I was going to go from reading clinical studies to some kind of product or business, I was going to have to do it on my own.Instead of just dropping the idea, I decided to double down instead and do some testing of my own. After I got healthy I started a MBA program, so I had a large pool of people who went out regularly. Many of the compounds I’d read about were fairly common supplements, so I started buying them and asked people to try them before they went out.Enter rejection #2: As it turns out, convincing people to take strange pills before they go out drinking is a challenge, even when you know them personally. Even though a lot of people were sketched out and wouldn’t try them, I found that the international crowd in my program was much more willing to try what I was offering.With trial and error, I was able to develop a formula that seemed really effective. Problem was, even with people vouching for it, the fact it was pills still scared off people. So I took that rejection, and turned it into inspiration: if people don’t want pills, maybe they’ll try something in a different format? So I started mixing my formula into liquid and having people try that.Enter rejection #3: While people were more willing to try a shot, it smelled and tasted positively horrifying. I got samples from flavor houses, talked to food scientists, tried a dozen different ways to get the taste down...nothing worked. Then things got worse.Enter rejection #4: My MBA program offered a variety of programs and services for startups that students were working on, and I applied for almost all of them. Funding? Applied for. Summer accelerator? Applied for. Pretty much across the board, I got turned down. I had one advocate in my corner, who led part of the school’s accelerator, and she confided that the “powers that be” had basically vetoed supporting my business because of its ties to alcohol.At this point, it would’ve been really easy to throw in the towel. Costs were building up from buying all the testing materials, and without any funding or support, it was either give up and get an internship, or debt finance the company...and put post-MBA job prospects in peril if the company didn’t work. Still, I knew my formula worked, and I knew people would want what I was making if I could make it in a form that wasn’t completely horrifying. So, I kept at it.As I entered the second year of my MBA, I gave up for the first time. No matter how many varieties I tried, no drink worked. But rather than give up entirely, I started experimenting with other ways I could make it.Enter lucky break #1: Another supporter of mine at my school was able to get me a free ticket to a conference at which a number of pharma and supplement companies would be present. While I was there, I saw how a number of them were marketing gummy vitamins and other gummy products. And that sparked an idea.When I got home, I bought some jello, some gelatin, and tossed my formula into the mix. Just like that, I went from god awful smelling and tasting drinks, to a gummy that actually tasted pretty decent! And the difference was night and day compared to the pills and drinks I had before. Whereas previously I’d had to convince people to try my formula, everyone loved the gummies. At this point I knew I definitely had something, but I also realized I couldn’t make a scalable company mixing my formula into jello in my kitchen, so I started looking into what it would take to do it at scale.Enter rejection #5: To sell a supplement, not only would it have to be made by a FDA registered manufacturer, but those manufacturers required massive minimum orders. Hundreds of thousands if not millions of gummies. I had already been financing the company through credit card debt for the better part of a year, but it would take multiple times what I’d already put in just to order the minimum. Still, it only cost a couple of thousand to run a small R&D trial to prove the concept, so once again I bit the bullet and kept digging.R&D proved successful, and were were able to make a gummy bear that the manufacturer could mass produce. At this point, my MBA program was just about over, but I had a product that people were really liking, and a pathway to bringing it to market. I just needed the funds to do it.Enter rejection #6: Ultimately, I decided to run a crowdfunding campaign. I spent the better of two months preparing, but still was trying to get the campaign ready for graduation. It was a disaster. The entire thing was rushed beyond belief, I had virtually no gummies to show, I hadn’t even finished the basic packaging design so I had no demos to show, and while I had a group of backers from my MBA program, it was entirely too self contained and overlapping an audience to work. So, for the second time I quit, and cancelled the campaign when it became apparent it wasn’t going to work.At this point, I was totally stuck. I didn’t have the funds to bring my product to market, nor could I legally make it myself in order to start slow and build up an customer base. So I started doing more fundraising. I’d met a few angels and VCs in the course of business school, and I met with as many as I could. I sat in on pitches, and gave pitches of my own. But, things were going slowly.Enter lucky break #2: while my crowdfunding campaign hadn’t worked out, it had received some positive attention from my friends and family network. Even after I cancelled it, a number expressed interest in the idea and the company, and I was ultimately able to raise an initial seed round that would allow me to make deposits on a first batch of gummies. But I still needed to raise more if I really wanted to be able to launch.Enter rejection #7: I spent most of the summer and early fall fundraising. It was a slog. Lots of conversations that went nowhere, and lots of “keep us updated”. I had some backing, but not enough if I wanted to aim for the kind of growth I was aiming for. I had bootstrapped a company with minimal funds once before so I knew exactly how much of a tooth and nail battle that was, and it was one I really wanted to avoid if I could. But I might not have a choice.Enter lucky break #3: One of the biggest parts of raising funds is networking. You never know who can make the right introduction, and in my case, that introduction came from an entirely unexpected source. Throughout my time working on the gummies, I’d had a number of CPG professionals inquire and basically pitch their services in launching the company; my background was in tech, so working with someone with more industry experience was something I had interest in. One firm in particular seemed like a good match, but it was definitely going to require me to raise more funds. As it turned out, that firm had its own VC network, and so an introduction was made. Less than a month later, I had a term sheet. Of course, things are never quite that easy. It took another two months and lots of back and forth with attorneys to go from offer sheet to signed deal.Of course, even now the journey is far from over. We have a great product, strong team, and high quality support, but curveballs still come from unexpected places, and there’s still plenty of ups and downs. But we’ll keep figuring out how to make things work, because if you’ve read this whole post, you know there are a lot of times I could’ve easily quit, but instead steady work (and a little good fortune) has conquered those obstacles. Problems of all shapes and sizes will come up. But building a quality product and a quality company means enduring through those problems.TL; DR: Starting a company requires facing a lot of challenges that can seem insurmountable, but with perseverance and creativity they can be overcome. Nothing good comes easy.

#/r/entrepreneur #reddit

0 notes

smpenvs30002018-blog · 7 years ago

Text

I’m Not Lost, Just on my Way

When I began this course almost four months ago, I had a limited understanding of nature interpretation. I truly believe this course has profoundly changed my outlook on life. As a minor example, I used to get an icky feeling near cemetery’s and felt that they were simply places of sombreness. However, after our lab at the Guelph Cemetery, my perspective on this aspect of death was suddenly given light. As another example, after our musical lab with James Gordon, I was inspired to write lyrics of my own. In fact, just two weeks ago I registered for my first guitar lesson, and am already able to play a few chords. I believe that I was “gifted a spark” in many ways throughout this course; not just in nature.

Upon entering this course, I had expectations to learn about effective nature interpretation. These expectations were exceeded, as I was not only given instructions on how to effectively interpret, but was also given the opportunity to practice interpreting to my peers. My presentations throughout this course provided me with a greater understanding of my preferred interpretive techniques, and my own opinions and beliefs. Below I have broken them down into the categories of personal ethics, beliefs and responsibilities. However, the information in these sections are not confined to one category, and in fact have much overlap.

My Personal Ethic

In terms of my personal morals and standards, I believe that honesty is pivotal. Being honest in the stories shared, being genuine in my excitement, and being truthful in my opinions are all essential for a developing nature interpreter. Another standard that should be valued as a developing interpreter is safety. I believe that interpreters should ensure that their activities are relatively safe; the content in discussion is appropriate; and that the participants do not feel forced to participate in any activities.

Csikszentmihalyi’s Characteristics of Flow, discussed earlier this semester is relevant here, as interpreters must maintain flow, where the participants are neither anxious nor bored. As a developing nature interpreter, I intend on making the audience fully aware of the dangers of my presentation, but do not want to scare the participants. At the beginning of the semester, Chris mentioned that interpreters should avoid discussing personal fears, such as that of bugs or deep water. This should be avoided because revealing these negative thoughts may affect the opinions of the audience, cause fear, or worst of all, take away a potential spark.

In addition, an important personal ethic of mine involves respect. Analogous to the Golden Rule in world religions, which states “do to others what you want them to do to you”, I believe interpreters should treat audience members in the same way they would like to be treated (Islamic Networks Group). For instance, when the audience is asked to give input and share their ideas, their contributions should be respectfully considered and acknowledged, just as I would want.

A photograph of the Golden Rule in world religions (Islam Networks Group).

My Beliefs

As a developing interpreter, I bring a variety of beliefs to the ways in which I interpret. I believe it is important to give people both time and space to process information, and to have few to zero expectations going into the interpretive walk. This will allow for a less structured program, encourage free flowing ideas and support unexpected detours. I also believe that it is perfectly okay to say “I am not entirely sure” in response to a question. Accepting that we can never know the answers to all the questions in life is truly liberating, and exhibits our human condition.

I also believe that preparation is important, but only to a certain extent. From my experience, usually the less rehearsed presentations flow more naturally, and the unexpected detours resonate most with the audience.

My Responsibilities

As both a 21-year old University of Guelph student and as a developing nature interpreter, I am aware of various responsibilities I have because of both moral and academic obligations. These responsibilities can be both easy and challenging to fulfill. An important responsibility of mine is conducting myself in a professional manner. The gift of professionalism presented by Beck & Cable, is helpful in proving to the audience that the guide is equipped and knowledgeable (Beck & Cable, 2011). I believe I have an important responsibility to ensure that the information I present is accurate and from reliable sources. Ensuring that information is accurate is morally just and imperative.

As a final responsibility, I believe that I have a duty to “leave no trace”, and to be a steward of the land. By interpreting nature following a “leave no trace” policy, may enlighten others about the significance of leaving the environment as it was originally, and may spark some interest in conservation.

The Spectrum of Environmental Ideologies

Environmental ideology is a way people think about the natural world to justify their actions towards it. An individual’s environmental ideology is a product of their values, attitudes, and actions towards the environment (Morgan, 2011). One practical way to order environmental ideologies is on a spectrum that represents a range of beliefs and human relationships with the natural world (Morgan, 2011).

A photograph of the spectrum of environmental ideologies. Retrieved from: https://prezi.com/bpas6kvdke5c/spectrum-of-environmental-ideologies/

Left: Human-centered AND Right: Nature –centered

On the left side of the spectrum, which is anthropocentric, the natural world and all its resources exist solely for human use. These resources are to be exploited and not be restrained or limited in any capacity. The left middle section, has a focus on conservationism, where resources are to be conserved for human use and enjoyment (Morgan, 2011).

On the middle right, these ideologies are more radical and move to a deeper questioning of the root causes of anti-environmental attitudes and behaviour, such as domination and exploitation. They are interested in animal rights and land-based ethics. On the far right, transformative ideologies are the focus. Here, nonhuman entities (plants, birds, invertebrates) have value that goes beyond utilitarian, scientific, aesthetic, or religious worth to possessing intrinsic value. On this side of the spectrum, humans are considered part of a biotic community (Morgan, 2011).

My ideologies resemble those close to the middle right section of this spectrum. I believe that environmental exploitation needs to be evaluated and limited for only essential resources. This ultimately positions me on a more nature-centered side, where I believe that it is our duty to protect nature. This spectrum is an accurate indicator of where I stand with my opinions on the environment, which consequently influences the way I interpret to my audience. These ideologies also affirm my moral responsibilities to leave no trace, and be a steward of the land. Where do you lie on the spectrum? And how does your environmental ideology affect your methods as a developing interpreter?

An image representing an anthropogenic lifestyle covering an ecocentric lifestyle. Retrieved from: https://permaculturenews.org/2017/04/12/people-really-care-environment/

Suitable Approaches

Interpretation can be accomplished in many forms, such as through music, art, writing and much more. I have many years of experience film making, public speaking and as a member of the debate society. Through these experiences, I have gained many interpersonal skills, public speaking skills and have an aptitude to think on the spot. I believe that speaking out loud to an audience is an interpretive approach that best suits my interests, skills and experiences.

In order to select suitable approaches for interpretation, I had to reflect on what worked well for me during my Jane’s walk presentation. Interacting with the audience by asking questions, made me less nervous as a presenter, as well as gave me an idea of how engaged my audience was, allowing me to gauge whether I should elaborate further or to move on to another point. In terms of Beck and Cable’s gifts, I would like to approach interpretation in the future with a focus on giving the gift of wholeness, because I enjoy larger concept webs and the connectivity of information (Beck & Cable, 2011). I value this gift, because I believe it is important to discuss regional and global wholes, to bring the context of our discussion to other regions and to different scales.

Self as World and World as Self: The Eureka Effect of Interconnectedness. Retrieved from: https://fractalenlightenment.com/36352/issues/self-as-world-and-world-as-self-the-eureka-effect-of-interconnectedness

A final, yet critical, suitable approach for future interpretation would be to ensure that the locations I am interpreting interest me, and that I am passionate about the topic of discussion. This will make it easier to interpret with enthusiasm, which will in turn capture more interest.

Conclusively, I believe all that was mentioned above effectively synthesizes my beliefs, insights, ethics, personality and opinions that I have developed over the duration of this course. This course taught me more about myself than I anticipated, and has also highlighted some areas to improve on as an interpreter. Although I still have much to learn, practice and experience, I am not lost in my path as an emerging interpreter, but simply on my way.

An image of an open road, to demonstrate that I am on my way as a developing interpreter. Retrieved from: https://www.mikkolagerstedt.com/blog/2013/6/19/on-my-way

References

Beck, L., & Cable, T. T. (2011). The Gifts of Interpretation. Urbana, IL: Sagamore Publishing.

Islamic Networks Group (n.d). First Principles of Religion: Treat Others As You Would Like To Be Treated (The Golden Rule). Retrieved from: https://ing.org/first-principles-religion-the-golden-rule/

Morgan, N (2011, September 9). Environmental Writing. Retrieved from: https://writingeco.wordpress.com/2011/09/09/chapter-2-a-spectrum-of-environmental-ideologies/

0 notes

mikemortgage · 7 years ago

Text

The Cannabis Power List: Movers and shakers we’re buzzing about in the pot world

Serruya Brothers back row left to right, Michael, Jack, Simon and Aaron Serruya. Front row, Aaron, Nathaniel and Sammy.

The Money: Serruya Brothers, Private Equity

By Joe Costaldo

Michael Serruya has never used cannabis. “But I am anxiously awaiting October 17,” says the managing director of Serruya Private Equity, referring to the date on which Canadians can legally consume the plant. “I think there are a lot of people like me out there.” It’s more than an idle observation: He’s deeply invested in the cannabis sector.

Michael and his brothers, Aaron and Simon, are perhaps best known to most as the trio behind Yogen Früz, founded in 1986. Today, their stable of brands also includes Yogurty’s, Pinkberry and Swensen’s ice cream. Despite their sweet tooth, their investments through Serruya Private Equity have ranged from telecom to real estate over the years, but they have also invested in around two-dozen cannabis-related firms since 2013. They’re now planning a chain of retail dispensaries and developing edibles and marijuana-infused beverages.

The Serruyas are betting their three decades in food retail will allow them to emerge as significant players in the cannabis industry. The family declined to put a dollar value on their cannabis investments, but the sector represents a large portion of their portfolio. “By our standards, it’s very significant,” Michael says.

The Serruyas got their start in the sector through a seed investment in a Leamington, Ont., flower farm that was in the process of converting to a licensed producer under the federal government’s medical marijuana program. That company, Aphria Inc., is now one of the country’s largest producers with a market cap of roughly $4 billion. They’re also the largest shareholders in Liberty Health Sciences Inc., a medicinal marijuana company based in Florida. Another holding, a California maker of edibles called Plus Products Inc., filed a preliminary prospectus in August to trade on the Canadian Securities Exchange. “We believe the U.S. is five or six years behind where Canada is today,” Michael says, adding he believes federal legalization is inevitable at this point given that so many states have already moved forward.

For now, though, much of the Serruyas’ attention remains at home. They have applied for retail licences in Alberta and plan to do the same in Ontario and British Columbia once the process is opened. They’ve already developed two different retail brands: One Plant, with the “Let’s be buds” slogan, is positioned as a higher-end label, while Purpl Flowr is designed to be a mid-market dispensary. Store renderings for both brands show bright, open concept layouts not unlike an Apple outlet, with display cases for cannabis strains, accessories and a clothing line. The stores will eventually be stocked with the Serruyas’ own line of edibles, including cookies, chocolates and gummies, which are in various stages of development. “We have an incredible ice cream,” Aaron says with a smirk. “Let’s leave it at that.”

The concept as depicted in the renderings, which show ample product branding, likely won’t comply with Canada’s strict approach to packaging, but the Serruyas believe governments will eventually loosen those restrictions. “We’re trying to stay ahead all the time to understand what the second and third innings will look like,” Michael says.

The Serruyas have identified around two-dozen properties in Ontario that could serve as retail locations. By April 2019, the date by which the provincial government has pegged for private sales, the Serruyas hope to have opened at least 10 stores followed by an aggressive rollout. The government has yet to outline private retail regulations, including how many outlets a single owner can operate. But the Serruyas are wagering Ontario will follow Alberta’s model, and the cap will be somewhere between 75 and 100 stores per operator. “We want to get to the max,” Michael says.

The cannabis business is a multi-generational family affair for the Serruyas. A fourth brother, Jack, is a director at Serruya Private Equity, and Michael and Aaron’s sons — Aaron, Samuel and Sammy — are driving the dispensary and edibles strategy. But Michael has made multiple trips to the U.S. states where cannabis sales are legal, spending hours hanging out in dispensaries to observe customers and staff, and glean which products are selling. (The family has also planted other observers in stores to count foot traffic.) “There are some insane, ridiculous numbers coming out of some of these dispensaries,” Michael says.

The older Aaron, meanwhile, can talk with ease about microdosing, dabbing and the high quality of California cannabis. If he gets a headache, he rubs some cannabidiol cream on his head. Even his mother, he notes, now uses CBD cream to help with a sore shoulder. “A friend of mine sent me an article recently that said there’s more money in cannabis than there is in ice cream,” he says. “It seems like a good time to transition.”

The Visionary: Bruce Linton, Canopy Growth

By Geoff Zochodne

A day after his company announced the biggest deal in the history of the cannabis industry, an audience with Bruce Linton had become a hot ticket. Originally, though, he was just supposed to give an early-morning PowerPoint presentation. “I thought, ‘How the hell am I actually going to get anybody to attend?’” he said to his audience. “And so then I orchestrated to get $5 billion invested. Because I didn’t want to be here by myself.”

The chairman and co-CEO of cannabis producer Canopy Growth Corp. looked and sounded confident that August morning, as he sat in front of a full room at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. His good mood was just- ified. Linton and Smiths Falls, Ont.-based Canopy had announced a day earlier that U.S. alcoholic beverage giant Constellation Brands Inc. would be boosting its stake in Canopy to around 38%. As Linton had noted, this worked out to an investment of about another $5 billion. The terms of the deal are such that Constellation, a Fortune 500 company, could increase its stake even further and become majority owner of Canopy.

The investment was the biggest yet in the cannabis sector, according to the two companies, and it followed an earlier investment by Constellation that had teed Canopy up to become a top player. Moreover, it sparked speculation that other big-name consumer companies may want to get into cannabis. Global giant Diageo PLC is one reported possibility.

The Constellation deal also puts Linton at the forefront of a part of the industry that isn’t even legal yet in this country. Of course, recreational cannabis isn’t quite yet legal either, though Canada will shortly become the first G7 country to take such a plunge. No wonder that audience with him in August was a full house. As he sat back, Linton weighed in on a wide variety of cannabis-related topics, as the blunt-talking exec has become a sort of spokesperson for his entire industry. “What I’ve learned is that if you’re not fairly specific and clear in your own head, and fairly specific and clear in how you express where you want to go, the best outcome could be random luck, because you’re easily misinterpreted,” Linton says.

After the Q&A in August, Linton allowed a scrum of media and conference attendees to form around him and lob questions for a length of time that would give any PR person nightmares. Selfies were taken. A green-and-white “Toronto Marijuana Leafs” jersey was produced and handed to Linton. The scene was a bit different than the one where Linton began his business career. According to his company bio, he started out at Ottawa-based firm Newbridge Networks Corp., which was gobbled up by French phone company Alcatel 18 years ago. But Linton has not strayed too far from those roots. He also co-chairs Martello Technologies Group Inc. alongside Terry Matthews, the billionaire founder of Newbridge. “To me, it’s something that means quite a bit,” says Linton of working with a former boss and mentor.

From Newbridge, Linton worked in leadership positions at webHancer Corp. and CrossKeys Systems Corp., before co-founding the company that would grow to be Canopy. His technology background might have shone through a bit in August, when he predicted there would be “Google-like” company in the cannabis industry. “Canopy is a tech company that produces and converts and commercializes marijuana,” he says. “Everything in tech is about how we go from creating one idea to one million units the fastest.”

Meanwhile, when acting as a de facto cannabis industry spokesperson, Linton tends to give a good quote. After the latest Constellation transaction was announced, and Canopy’s stock price took flight, Linton assured BNN that his lifestyle would not be in for any major changes. This, of course, was despite Linton owning approximately 2.8 million shares of Canopy, which are now worth more than $190 million, according to recent Bloomberg data. “I don’t think I need anything,” Linton told the business television network. “I got this suit at Winners. It looks okay on TV.”

Canopy still has some big plans, including one to tap the emerging medical marijuana market in Latin America. Linton has suggested Canopy could go even further with the added capital from Constellation. “This is really rocket fuel,” he says. “We’re going to be expanding production, we’re going to be doing more research, we’re going to develop more intellectual property, we’re going to create more leading brands, we’re going to have more products, and we’re going to be way more global.”

The Innovator: Brendan Kennedy, Tilray

By Rosalind Stefanac

Innovation is par for the course when you’re a company of firsts in an emerging market, and medical cannabis producer Tilray Inc. has been setting the bar high for what’s possible for what seems like ages in an industry that’s only just begun. “There’s a reason we’re in so many countries and why, when a country like the U.K. legalizes medical cannabis, Tilray products are the first they choose,” says CEO Brendan Kennedy, who joined the company’s Canadian subsidiary as CEO in 2013. “I think we are the gold standard.”

Among its many firsts, this Nanaimo, B.C.-based company — which was born out of a Seattle-based private-equity firm founded by Kennedy called Privateer Holdings — in October 2017 was the first Canadian producer licensed to export medical marijuana outside of Canada. Today, its products are available in 11 countries across five continents. “What differentiates us from competitors is the fact we’re recognized as being a scientifically rigorous pharmaceutical brand that is approved by governments and regulators across the world,” says Kennedy, noting that Tilray was also the first cannabis company to be approved by Health Canada in a clinical trial.

A recent collaboration with pharmaceutical manufacturer Sandoz Canada will extend Tilray’s reach even further. “By being the first to partner [with a pharma company] we get to collaborate on the development of new products,” Kennedy says. “Partnering with a pharmaceutical brand that physicians and pharmacists are familiar with also inspires confidence with the mainstream medical community here and globally.”

Most of Tilray’s products outside of Canada are already distributed through pharmacies so its supply chain is identical to drug company supply chains around the world. The company will also ship its first product to a pharmacy chain in Canada within the next six months.

It’s this kind of global thinking at the helm that has set Tilray apart from the get-go. “This isn’t an industry you can study behind a desk or outsource to other people,” says Kennedy, who spent his first year in the industry back in 2010 conducting “boots on the ground” research. At times, that entailed travelling the world to talk to everyone from growers and processors to patients and politicians. “I started in Oregon and went right on through to the dirt roads of B.C. and coffee shops of Amsterdam,” he says. “I had to form my opinions first-hand.”

This hands-on approach to research has certainly paid off. Under Kennedy’s leadership, Tilray was the first pure-play marijuana company to go public on the Nasdaq, a tactic others are sure to follow, and continues to expand its cultivation facilities in Canada and Portugal. It has also secured distribution deals with five provinces and two territories for several of its brands. “We are very excited with these contracts and expect to see additional agreements coming,” he says.

With the impending legalization of recreational cannabis in Canada, Kennedy anticipates another enormous marketplace for Tilray to grow. This past April, the supplier announced the creation of High Park Co., a wholly owned subsidiary based in Toronto that will produce and distribute a broad base of adult-use products in Canada. “There’s this misconception that cannabis legalization is specific to North America and other niche areas, but that couldn’t be further from the truth,” he says. “We’re in the midst of a global paradigm shift where a multi-billion-dollar illicit industry will be transitioning to a legal one.”

Canada may be one of the first countries to legalize recreational cannabis, but other countries are looking at adopting a similar regulatory framework. Kennedy says that trend gives companies such as his a tremendous opportunity to build global, adult-use brands. “There is no road map for building an industry from scratch, but we really are trying to do it right from a scientific and business perspective.”

The Lawyer: Trina Fraser, Brazeau Seller Law

By Rosalind Stefanac

Early on, if someone had told contract lawyer Trina Fraser she’d be dedicating her career to the business of commercializing cannabis, she would have thought it unfathomable. “It didn’t enter my consciousness that I would be doing this, because I didn’t realize medical cannabis was even available,” she says.

But in 2013, while trying to help a family member access cannabidiol (CBD) oil for a severe form of epilepsy, Fraser’s advocacy side kicked in. “When I saw all the roadblocks preventing patients from accessing the medicines that would actually help them, I had to jump in and say, ‘That’s not right’,” she says.

Today, as one of the most prominent cannabis legal experts, Fraser says the cannabis business makes up 90% of her practice. As well as acting for licensed producers of medical cannabis, she advises industry players, including clinics, software/application providers, capital investors and those seeking entry to the consumer market. (Many of her clients are looking to be involved in both.) “There is no shortage of potential clients,” says the Ottawa native who is a co-partner at Brazeau Seller Law (BSL) and head of the firm’s CannaLaw Group. “I get multiple emails and phone calls [from prospects] every single day.”

Five years ago, BSL was among the first law firms to take on entrepreneurs and investors interested in the medical cannabis market when no one else would have them. It was a unique opportunity to be at the forefront of an emerging industry, Fraser says, and her firm’s partners were fortunately unconcerned by the stigma that prevented many established companies from participating. Yet even at that point, she never anticipated consumer legalization would be just around the corner. “Now the industry at large is getting seduced by the fact we are making law in uncharted territory and there are a ton of legal and financial firms looking at the opportunities.”

The craze is not just limited to those law and finance firms either. The looming deadline for legalizing consumer cannabis in October is causing a frenzy of new industry players of late. “In the last six months to a year, alcohol, tobacco and pharma companies are seeing the writing on the wall and recognizing they need to get in here too,” Fraser says. “This industry is not going away and the fact it’s grown to this behemoth even before recreational legalization is mind boggling.”

If Fraser sounds excited, she is. “I literally spend hours every day reading up on legislation and keeping track of what’s going on in the world at large in this area.” Her enthusiasm and knowledge has attracted 8,500 Twitter followers and she is regularly called on for speaking engagements, media comment and expert opinion, such as giving evidence to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health on Bill C45 when the cannabis act was being studied in 2017. “It’s an adrenaline rush to check my Twitter feed to see what deals were announced or who got licensed today.”

Indeed, Fraser, who also serves on the board of directors for Canadians for Fair Access to Medical Marijuana and provides legal advice to the Cannabis Council of Canada, is sometimes criticized for pushing the cannabis agenda a little too vehemently. But this mother of two says she would never promote policies or regulations that come at the expense of her children and the world they live in. “I believe legalization will benefit my children, because I can have a fact-based discussion with them about risks and good choices,” she says. “I’d much rather have a legalized cannabis store in my neighborhood than an illegal one.”

In the future, Fraser hopes to be remembered for having a “principled and balanced approach” to the business of cannabis. That means continuing to advocate for a system that makes cannabis accessible to the people who need it and ensuring there is space for a variety of players. “This is a diverse industry and Canada is being looked at as a world leader with a high-quality product and robust regulatory framework,” she says. “I don’t want the industry taken over by big operators at the expense of smaller ones who have unique products.” FPM

from Financial Post https://ift.tt/2xYTktX via IFTTT Blogger Mortgage Tumblr Mortgage Evernote Mortgage Wordpress Mortgage href="https://www.diigo.com/user/gelsi11">Diigo Mortgage

#IFTTT #Financial Post

0 notes

gesteckt1 · 7 years ago

Text

Samsung r428 Battery all-laptopbattery.com

Depending on the underlying hardware, a two-core OpenShift slice can support as many as 25 different applications, according to Badani. That initial two-core license to OpenShift Enterprise will run $5,500 with a standard support contract, with larger slices costing more and premium support costing more, too. Nokia's N-Gage, Palm's Foleo, Motorola's Atrix, Apple's Newton MessagePad, HD DVD, Sony's Rolly, Sony's Mylo, Philips' CD-i, Commodore's CD-TV, IBM's PCJr, the Camputer's Lynx, Gizmondo, the Phantom, Atari's Jaguar, MySpace, Beenz - behind every iPad there are dozens and dozens of technology products that aspired to greatness but were successful only in their distinct lack of commercial success.Some were simply beaten by better rivals, others were just released too early or too late, still more were just plain wrong. Not all were specific products - entire categories of goods and services have been hailed as the Next Big Thing only to disappear with nothing but a handful of miserable early adopters to show they were ever there.Here, then, are some of our favourite tech fails - products, technologies, concepts and trends - from the past 30-odd years.

In 1995, Microsoft replaced Windows 3’s rather rubbish GUI with a - for the time - snazzier interface and called it Windows 95. And then it decided that menus, windows, and icons for applications and, now, documents wasn’t what ordinary folk wanted at all. So it released BOB, a new UI for Windows that placed apps and services in a cartoon house. Like the original Mac desktop, there was a kind of logic to it - put the virtual things into a context users would understand from real life - but at least the Apple UI didn’t require a cartoon dog and a cartoon paperclip to show folk around. It was, you won’t be surprised to learn, a complete flop. BOB was killed off, though the dog survived as Windows XP’s search mascot.Even by the late 1990s, pundits were already predicting the death of the PC. The new Millennium would herald the ‘post-PC era’, they said, a time when World+Dog, particularly the non-techie part, would access the internet cheaply and easily through set-top boxes and TVs rather than pricey desktop or laptop computers. Of course, back then most homes didn’t have digital television let alone home broadband and wireless networks. Consumer internet usage was in its infancy.

Attempts to build these so-called ‘information appliances’ invariably offered a sub-standard - as defined by the personal computer - experience. Instead, punters adopted the ever-cheaper PCs now coming in from Far Eastern manufacturers, and we’d have to wait another ten years for products that looked like they might supplant the traditional computer.Early in the 1990s, bright sparks at Apple, Microsoft, IBM, Novell and WordPerfect decided that the answer to the accretion of features that was beginning to bog down the productivity apps of the time was to rethink the relationship between documents and applications. Documents, they said, should be standalone entities able to contain any type of data and not be tied to specific apps, which would no longer be monolithic programs but small editors invoked when the user clicked on an appropriate data type. So, click on some text and the word processor app would be loaded. Click on a table in the same document and the spreadsheet module would be loaded. Users could pick different editors from different vendors, but work in the one document.

Samsung q308 Battery

Samsung q310 Battery

Samsung q318 Battery

Samsung q320 Battery

Samsung q322 Battery

Samsung q428 Battery

Samsung q430 Battery

Samsung q460 Battery

Samsung q470 Battery

Samsung q520 Battery

Samsung q528 Battery

Samsung q530 Battery

Samsung r20 Battery

Samsung r25 Battery

Samsung r39 Battery

Samsung r40 Battery

Samsung r41 Battery

Samsung r45 Battery

Samsung r50 Battery

Samsung r55 Battery

Samsung r60 Battery

Samsung r65 Battery

Samsung r70 Battery

Samsung r408 Battery

For Microsoft, with its OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) technology, it was all about beefing up Office. For the others, it was about loosening Office’s dominance of the productivity software business. No prizes for guessing which of the two is still being used today. OpenDoc ended up requiring too much memory - the editor apps weren’t as lightweight as intended - and with no standard way of encoding for each type of data, one bitmap editor module could not necessarily open a picture worked on in another bitmap editor.Was the Personal Digital Assistant a fail? It’s true that what we now call a smartphone is heir to the PDA and, if you count all the organisers that the likes of Palm, Sony and others sold in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the PDA, as a category, proved incredibly successful. But what about the PDA as originally conceived? Even today’s iPhones and Androids don’t quite provide the automated, intelligent organiser that Apple CEO John Sculley had in mind when he coined the term PDA back in the mid-1990s. His notion, to be embedded (kind of) in the Newton MessagePad, was of a device that constantly tracked its user’s activities, learning and eventually anticipating what they wanted to get up to - in short to be the digital equivalent of a PA.

Apple didn’t get it right then and even its Siri, which sits voice recognition on top of a search engine, isn’t sufficiently sophisticated to organise your life for you. Apple’s Newton was a flop and was out-paced by the more basic, cheaper Palm Pilot, which was never tried to be anything more than a digital diary and contacts list.It’s 2004, and Apple has been selling iPods for three years, initially for Mac users but later for Windows PC owners too. It has iTunes to sell songs. Consumers are keen. In response, Microsoft launches Plays For Sure, an attempt to regain some level of control of the digital music player market by encouraging iPod and iTunes competitors to come together and back its Windows Media Player formats. The pitch to punters: buy from any compatible store you want, and play your music on any compatible device you want. Lots of hardware vendors signed up; so did music suppliers. But success did not follow. Content companies were keener on selling subscriptions than the single tracks punters wanted, and most players didn’t have marketing might behind them that Apple had granted the iPod. Fail For Sure.

Samsung r410 Battery

Samsung r418 Battery

Samsung r420 Battery

Samsung r423 Battery

Samsung r425 Battery

Samsung r428 Battery

Samsung r429 Battery

Samsung r430 Battery

Samsung r431 Battery

Samsung r439 Battery

Samsung r440 Battery

Samsung r453 Battery

Samsung r458 Battery

Samsung r458r Battery

Samsung r460 Battery

Samsung r462 Battery

Samsung r463 Battery

Samsung r463h Battery

Samsung r464 Battery

Samsung r465 Battery

Samsung r465h Battery

Samsung r466 Battery

Samsung r467 Battery

Samsung r468 Battery

Samsung r468h Battery

Microsoft tried again in 2006 with the more iPod/iTunes-like Zune. It still couldn’t get it right, and knocked Zune on the head in June 2012.Long before Canada’s Research in Motion popularised the term ‘push’ for delivered email, a number of firms, most notably PointCast, used the word to describe new information services that actively sent out updates to users rather simply wait for the users to fire up a web browser and come and get them. PointCast hoped consumers and businesses would be excited by having useful information delivered to their digital door, logging in to their desktops to find news and such waiting for them. There was enough of a buzz around the notion for even Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation to consider buying PointCast.But the gap PointCast and others hoped to fill was quickly covered by the then emerging portal websites like Excite and Yahoo! who found that users were happy enough to visit such sites regularly anyway, a process made easy by browser bookmarks. By the end of the 1990s, PointCast and many of its rivals were gone, though the notion of getting information updates, albeit through by pulling them over, was carried on by the developers of the RSS feed.

Oh, how we were all going to create 3D avatars and use them to live a parallel existence in a virtual world of our own making. Many of us did, of course, but through the likes of World of Warcraft not Second Life, Linden Labs’ mid-2000s attempt to realise William Gibson’s ‘consensual hallucination’ concept of cyberspace - and to make a buck to two into the bargain. Unfortunately, Second Life couldn’t decide if it was a game, an online hang-out or a brand new, 3D paradigm for web-based commerce and services, but for a time, while major corporations that really should have known better were dashing to establish Second Life shopfronts, it didn’t seem to matter. Punters created their avatars and spent real money on virtual cash to spend on expensive plots of unreal land.

0 notes

bizmediaweb · 7 years ago

Text

23 Benefits of Social Media for Business

What are the benefits of using social media for business? Consider that there are now more than 3 billion using social networks across the globe.

And these people are using social to engage with brands.

Sherpa Marketing found that more people follow brands on social media than follow celebrities. On Instagram alone 80 percent of people follow at least one business.

If you’re not taking advantage of social, you’re missing out on a fast, inexpensive, and effective way to reach almost half the world’s population.

Let’s look at the many ways in which social media can help you connect, engage, and grow your business.

Bonus: Get the step-by-step social media strategy guide with pro tips on how to grow your social media presence with Hootsuite.

Benefits of social media for brand building

1. Increase brand awareness

With nearly half of the world’s population using social media platforms, they’re a natural place to reach new and highly targeted potential customers.

Think people only connect with brands they already know on social media? Consider that 60 percent of Instagram users say they discover new products on the platform.

When Absolut Vodka ran an Instagram campaign to promote its limited edition Spark bottle, the company achieved a five-point lift in brand awareness.

2. Humanize your brand

A UK study from Trinity Mirror Solutions found that more than half of adults do not trust a brand until they see “real-world proof” that the brand is keeping its promises.

To connect with customers—and potential customers—you’ve got to show the human side of your brand. How are you embracing your brand values? (Do you even have brand values?) How are you looking out for the best interests of your customers and employees? Does your product really work?

The ability to create real human connection is one of the key benefits of social media for business. We call these Meaningful Relationship Moments. Introduce your followers to the people who make up your company and showcase how existing customers are using and benefiting from your products.

A social media advocacy program can be a great way to humanize your brand.

3. Establish your brand as a thought leader

No matter what industry your business is in, social media offers the opportunity to establish your brand as a thought leader—the go-to source for information on topics related to your niche.

Like brand advocacy, thought leadership is a great way to build consumer trust. In fact, LinkedIn research in partnership with Edelman shows that marketers underestimate just how much thought leadership can impact trust, especially for B2B marketers. About half of B2B marketers surveyed believed their thought leadership would build trust in their companies. However, more than 80 percent of buyers said thought leadership builds trust.

The 2018 Edelman Trust Barometer also found that 63 percent of people trust technical experts, compared to only 42 percent of people who trust businesses.

Hootsuite CEO Ryan Holmes has more than 1.5 million followers on LinkedIn, where he shares his insights about social media and entrepreneurship.

LinkedIn—particularly the LinkedIn Publishing Platform—is a great social network to focus on when aiming to establish yourself as a thought leader.

4. Stay top of mind

Most social media users log into their accounts at least once per day, according to Pew Research Center, and many people are checking social multiple times per day.

Social media gives you to the opportunity to connect with fans and followers every time they log in. Keep your social posts entertaining and informative, and your followers will be glad to see your new content in their feeds, keeping you top of mind so you’re their first stop when they’re ready to make a purchase.

Benefits of social media for growth

5. Increase website traffic

Social media posts and ads are key ways to drive traffic to your website. Sharing great content from your blog or website to your social channels is a great way to get readers as soon as you publish a new post

Participating in social chats—like the weekly #HootChat on Twitter—can also be a great way to increase your visibility, get attention from new people, showcase your expertise, and drive traffic to your website.

A2: Curating content helps you: – Save time – Build relationships with other sources – Provide new perspectives that support your own content While it’s not a replacement for creating content, it has many benefits. #HootChat

— UpContent (@getupcontent) April 19, 2018

Offer great value in the chat, rather than being too promotional. Just make sure your website address is included in all of your social media profiles so that people who want to learn more about you can do so with one easy click. Even better, use a pinned post to highlight a landing page on your website that’s relevant to the chat.

6. Generate leads

Social media offers an easy and low-commitment way for potential customers to express interest in your business and your products. Lead generation is such an important benefit of social media for business that many social networks offer advertising formats specifically designed to collect leads.

For example, Renault Europe used Facebook lead ads that allowed people interested in learning more about a new model to book a test drive directly from Facebook, with just a couple of taps.

The ads had a 7.9 times lower cost per lead than ads linking to a form on the car manufacturer’s website.

7. Boost sales

No matter what you sell, social media can help you sell it. Your social accounts are a critical part of your sales funnel—the process through which a new contact becomes a customer.

As the number of people using social media continues to grow and social sales tools evolve, social networks will become increasingly important for product search and ecommerce. The time is right to align your social marketing and sales goals.

For individual sales professionals, social selling is already a critical tool.

Take Hootsuite Academy’s Social Selling Course and learn how to find leads and drive sales with social media.

8. Partner with influencers

Word of mouth drives 20 to 50 percent of purchasing decisions. When you get people talking about your product or company on social media, you build brand awareness and credibility, and set yourself up for more sales.

One key way to drive social word of mouth is to partner with influencers—people who have a large following on social media and can draw the attention of that following to your brand.

Research from Nielsen, Carat, and YouTube shows that collaborating with an influencer can give your brand four times more lift in brand familiarity than collaborating with a celebrity.

Benefits of social media for content creation and distribution

9. Promote content

Promoting your content on social channels is a great way to get your smart, well-researched content in front of new people, proving your expertise and growing your audience.

For example, Adobe used LinkedIn Sponsored Content to showcase its research, including infographics and videos.

Marketing decisions-makers exposed to Adobe’s promoted content were 50 percent more likely to view Adobe as shaping the future of digital marketing and 79 percent more likely to agree that Adobe could help them optimize media spend.

To maximize the social media for business benefits, make sure to have a content marketing plan in place.

10. Go viral

As people start liking, commenting on, and sharing your social posts, your content is exposed to new audiences—their friends and followers. Going viral takes this concept one step further. As people share your content with their networks, and their networks follow suit, your content spreads across the internet, getting thousands or even millions of shares.

This exposure is especially beneficial because all those shares, likes, and comments show an existing connection with your brand. If I see that my friend likes your article, I may be inclined to check out what you have to say, even if I’ve never heard of your company before. In a world where there is far more content than any one person could ever consume, a friend’s social share acts as a kind of pre-screening.

Going viral is no easy task, of course, but without social media it would be next to impossible.

11. Source content

There are two key ways businesses can source content on social media:

Source ideas: Ask your followers what they want, or engage in social listening, to come up with ideas for content you can create yourself. Put simply: Give people what they’re asking for. It’s a sure way to create content that people will want to read and share.

Source material for posts: Create a contest or use a hashtag to source user-generated content (UGC) you can share. Getting your followers involved can build excitement about your brand while also providing you with a library of social posts to share over time.

Just how much content can you get through a UGC campaign? Check out the #wanderlustcontest hashtag from National Geographic, which has generated more than 60,000 posts.

Benefits of social media for communication

12. Reputation management

Your customers are already talking about you on social media, whether or not you’re there to respond. If you and your team are on the ball, you can pick up on important social posts about your brand to highlight the positive and address the negative before it turns into a major issue.

Is someone saying something about your business that’s not true? Be sure to share your side of the story in a polite, professional way. Someone singing your praises? Send them plenty of thanks and draw attention to their kind words.

13. Crisis communication

When a Philadelphia Starbucks store had two black men arrested, the hashtag #BoycottStarbucks went viral, and fast. The hashtag was used more than 100,000 times in just three days. That is officially a crisis.

Starbucks, to its credit, responded quickly.

We apologize to the two individuals and our customers for what took place at our Philadelphia store on Thursday. pic.twitter.com/suUsytXHks

— Starbucks Coffee (@Starbucks) April 14, 2018

After this first apology, the company followed up with several more statements on social media, and announced that it would close all of its stores for a day of racial-bias training. It remains to be seen what the long-term effects of this incident will be for the Starbucks brand, but the consequences would almost certainly been worse if the company had not responded quickly and appropriately on social media.

Does your company have a plan in place for dealing with a crisis? While smaller brands may not have a crisis blow up to such a large scale, a smaller number of shares can have a devastating impact within a tight-knit community or niche.

Silence is not an option when it comes to responding to crises on social media. Maintaining well-run and managed social accounts and having a plan in place can help make sure you’re present and ready to engage if the worst occurs.

14. Customer and audience engagement

Social networks give you the opportunity to interact directly with customers and fans, and likewise give them the chance to interact directly with your brand. Unlike traditional media, which offers only one-way communication, social media is a two-way street.

If you want customers and followers to be engaged, you have to be engaged yourself. Stay active and respond to comments and questions on your own social media posts in a way that’s appropriate to your brand.

pic.twitter.com/TJvCmIsuxq

— Postmates Support (@Postmates_Help) May 26, 2017

You can also use social media monitoring to keep an eye on what people are saying across the social web.

15. Customer service and customer support

People expect brands to be available on social media and seek out their social accounts for customer service. Research published in the Harvard Business Review shows that brands who don’t meeting those expectations damage their bottom line.

The HBR research, which specifically looks at Tweets, shows that customers who receive a response to their Tweet would be willing to spend more with the brand on a later purchase, especially if they get a response within five minutes. That holds true even when the initial Tweet was a flat-out complaint.

Benefits of social media for gaining insights

16. Monitor conversations that are relevant to your brand

We mentioned social media monitoring above as an important element of audience engagement. But it’s also important as a key source of intelligence about your brand, your competitors, and your niche.

17. Learn more about your customers

Social media generates a huge amount of data about your customers in real time. You can use that information to make smarter business decisions.

All of the major social networks offer analytics that provide demographic information about the people interacting with your account. This can help you tailor your strategy to better speak to your real audience.

We’ve created extensive guides on how to use analytics in Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Snapchat, and Pinterest, so there’s no excuse to remain in the dark about your customers and social followers.

18. Gauge sentiment around your brand

Lots of mentions is a good thing, right? Sure, in many cases. But if you’re getting lots of mentions with a negative sentiment, you need to do some quick thinking to figure out what’s gone wrong and address the problem.

Hootsuite’s social engagement coordinator, Nick Martin, defines social media sentiment as “the perceived positive or negative mood being portrayed in a social media post or engagement.”

While it’s important to know how much people are talking about your brand online, it’s also important to know how people actually feel about your brand.

Using social media for your business allows you to stay on top of sentiment analysis so you can protect your brand reputation.

Bonus: Get the step-by-step social media strategy guide with pro tips on how to grow your social media presence with Hootsuite.

19. Keep an eye on the competition

It’s also important to know what people are saying about your competitors.

For example, tracking mentions of your competitors might reveal pain points with their products that you could reach out to address, winning new customers in the process.

When Uber Canada launched a promotion to deliver free ice cream for a day in Vancouver, things went spectacularly wrong. People couldn’t get their free ice cream, and they were not happy about it. They took to social media to complain.

The social team at Skip The Dishes saw an opportunity and reached out to people complaining about Uber with a free ice cream delivery of their own, in the form of a Skip The Dishes credit. All those Uber haters quickly turned into Skip The Dishes fans, and new customers (since you had to create a Skip The Dishes Account to get your free ice cream).

Thanks for delivering free ice cream to the office @SkipTheDishes. When #UberIceCreamFAIL , #skipthedishes saves the day! Happy Friday! pic.twitter.com/3Se2AbbdFj

— Leavetown (@LeaveTownNow) August 25, 2017

Monitoring the competition on social media also means you’ll be aware when you competitors launch new products, run promotions, and release new reports or data.

20. Stay on top of industry news

In the online world, things move fast—and you can’t afford to be left behind. Keeping a virtual ear to the ground through social listening makes sure you’re always informed about upcoming changes to your industry that could affect the way you do business.

Benefits of social media for advertising

21. Targeted advertising

Social ads are an inexpensive way to promote your business and distribute content. They also offer powerful targeting options so you can reach the right audience and make the most of your budget.

Savvy marketers have embraced this key benefit of social media for business: They will spend twice as much on Facebook ads in 2018 as they will on newspaper advertising.

With ad targeting options including demographic information, geography, language, and even online behaviors, you can craft specific messages that best speak to different groups of potential customers, and only pay for the exact viewers you want to reach.

22. Retargeting

Nearly 70 percent of online shopping carts are abandoned.

People who have abandoned products in a shopping cart are prime potential customers. They have already found your website, browsed your products, and made a decision about what they might want. People abandon shopping carts for many reasons, but someone who has expressed this degree of interest in your company should not be ignored.

Using tracking tools like the Facebook Pixel, you can show these potential customers social media ads for the exact products they have browsed on your website or placed in the shopping cart.

For example, the craft site Craftsy used retargeting Facebook ads to promote products to people who had already interacted with a product page on the Craftsy site.

The campaign saw a 4.3 times return on ad spend and 33 percent increase in Facebook-driven revenue.

Benefits of social media for proving ROI

23. Reporting and analytics

It is always a challenge for marketers to prove return on investment. But with social media tracking and analytics tools, you can see the full impact of your social media activities, from follows to engagements right through to purchases.

Tools like Google Analytics and Hootsuite Impact track website traffic generated from social media, conversions, email sign-ups, and ROI for both organic and paid social media campaigns.

UTM parameters are another great tracking tool that will help you see which social networks are providing the most benefits for your business.

Use Hootsuite to easily manage all your social media channels from one dashboard. Grow your brand, engage customers, keep up with competitors, and measure results. Try it free today.

Get Started

The post 23 Benefits of Social Media for Business appeared first on Hootsuite Social Media Management.

23 Benefits of Social Media for Business published first on https://themarketingheaven.tumblr.com/

0 notes

luxus4me · 8 years ago

Link

Entrepreneur: Latest Articles http://j.mp/2fD3mHF

You may not know of Ivanna Chubbuck, but you have heard of her students. Her clientele, such as Charlize Theron, Brad Pitt and Halle Barry, have won multiple Academy Awards, Emmys, Golden Globes and Tony Awards. She is the multimillionaire coach and founder behind the Ivana Chubbuck Studio. In addition to her personal one-on-one coaching, her Los Angeles-based studio has 16 ongoing classes, and Chubbuck regularly facilitates classes overseas. "The celebrity whisperer" has been featured in The New York Times, People, USA Today, Paris Vogue and various television shows in the U.S. and abroad.

Chubbuck is also the creator of the cutting edge and widely adopted Chubbuck Technique which is taught by accredited teachers in over 16 countries. Her book explaining the technique, The Power of the Actor, is an international bestseller. Her methods spark change in the participants' lives, not just their work, and have been so effective for so many that Chubbuck has recently begun facilitating corporate workshops in addition to acting intensives.

I was excited to get to interview a member of Hollywood royalty about how to be an effective coach, grow a massive coaching business and achieve success in both business and life. Here are my top eight lessons from our conversation.

Figure out what you enjoy.

As you know as a reader of Entrepreneur, finding a niche is vital in business. Once you realize you want to be a coach or consultant, narrow down on your favorite topics. Chubbuck had great advice for figuring things out.

"When things are really interesting to you, time goes really fast. But, it's the same amount of time but it feels really fast, so an hour becomes a minute and an hour could also feel like 10 hours, depending on your enthusiasm, your passion and your connection to whatever it is you're doing ... when I was teaching actors, the time went by super-fast, and when I was acting it went so slow," she said. She added that even her 12-hour intensive sessions fly by. Ask yourself when time speeds up for you as a guide for where to place your focus.

Be willing to sacrifice.

Chubbuck explained that for years she "lived small." She didn't expect to get paid large fees at first, since her struggling actor clients were surviving on ramen noodles, sometimes even living out of their cars. But money, to her, was the gravy. The work itself was the steak, so she didn't mind the sacrifices.

"I skipped meals, I walked to places to save on gas. I mean, I've lived very small, and I was fine with that because I was following my passion."

Her first big break was about 10 years into coaching, but before that she explained it was "a slow and steady incline."

Be willing to let go.

Chubbuck's method is now a certified program for other coaches. She has coaches and schools teaching her technique all over the world. How did she achieve that kind of scale? "You have to give up control."

You may not want to license your materials, but if you want to grow your practice beyond what you alone can coach each month, for example through self-study online programs or hiring support staff to take on some of the load, you're going to have to give up some control.

Chubbuck also mentioned the importance of letting go of what others think. She said she would consider this one of her keys to success. "Don't care what people think, you just keep plugging along and follow your passion. Your passion is infectious .... You may have a down time, but you'll get back on top, and I've seen this happen a whole bunch of times."

She also advises that you let go of your specific path to success. She initially thought she was going to be an actress, but listened to her intuition and stayed open to the possibilities. "If you contain yourself in any shape or form -- to a certain aspect of things that you think that you want to do, or that you [believe is] the dream -- you've also contained other things from coming in. You ... basically took away the possibility of success."

Capitalize on momentum.

"It'd been 10 years before it got to me, and all of a sudden Halle Berry says my name at the Academy Awards and it went 'Booooooom!'" Chubbuck recalled the frenzy of business after that night. She knew she needed to capitalize on what was happening, so she wrote her book. I went, 'Now I'm gonna do something with that.'"

Chubbuck's book spent weeks on the Los Angeles Times Top 10 Bestsellers List and has now been translated into 12 languages. In my personal experience growing my brand, building up The Pursuit, getting more speaking and writing opportunities, etc., this tactic has been critical. The second you catch a break, ask yourself how can I ride this wave? How can I make the most of this? How can I use this to take myself to the next level?

Talk with people, not at them.

I asked Chubbuck what she believed caused coaches to fail with their students or as a business. She answered that too often coaches take a "mountain top" stance, shouting down to everyone what they need to do. But, no one likes being talked down to. She also shared the importance of vulnerability with students.

"If they feel that you, too, have the same issues, all of a sudden they feel more open, not alone ... as a team, we are going to learn ... both of us are going to grow as a result of this relationship," she said. "The other thing: Never judge."

Chubbuck went on to share that she sees the coach/student relationship as a symbiotic one. "When I feed them and I see greatness happen out of them, you know what, that feeds me."

Embrace your business sense.

As an artist who coaches artists, she has heard the "creative" excuse many times. She says that this excuse is denying one's business sense, which most people can find and improve. Personally, I started my career as a musician and graphic designer; I have learned the value -- and fun -- in strengthening the "left side" of my brain. Chubbuck embraced both sides of herself early on.

"I start off with this concept of how to make the business plan work, and I go, Well, this part's working, but this part's not .... I'm gonna change the part that's not working ... it's a creative process if you choose to look at it that way. This is my business cap, now I take that off and put my creative cap on. And I like them both, because they both connect the dots together for me."

Never stop learning.

Want to be a millionaire coach? How many books are you reading? How many courses are you taking? Actually, in today's information-saturated world, maybe the better question is, are you regularly absorbing and implementing new things? Like almost everyone I interview, Chubbuck places a high importance on learning and personal development.

"Educators should always learn ... if you stop learning in your process, and [this is for any and every job] if you stop learning then you stop living. Living is all about education. Raising the bar, meeting the bar, raising the bar."

Choose to overcome.

I was inspired when I researched Chubbuck's methods because all of her work focuses on not the hardships or the feelings, but on the overcoming. As entrepreneurs, we understand how devastating setbacks can be not just to the bottom line, but to our morale as well.

"You have a choice to make. [When bad things happen you can] say, This is something that I'm going to self-destruct with, bad things always happen to me, be defeated by it, and stop. [Or you could say], You know what? I'm gonna win in spite of it, because people said I couldn't."

She shared that most of us face many bad things in life, but they aren't all bad if you choose to see the circumstances as fuel.

"It's fuel to inspire you ... I'm not ever gonna let this happen again, and that person's never going to do that to me again, and this is how I'm going to succeed. Without retribution, without being mean or trying to get comeuppance, but just to prove them wrong."

Watch in-depth interviews with celebrity entrepreneurs on The Pursuit with Kelsey Humphreys

Related: 8 Tactics to Build a Multimillion-Dollar Publishing Business

Entrepreneur Network is premium video network providing entertainment, education and inspiration from successful entrepreneurs and thought leaders. We provide expertise and opportunities to accelerate brand growth and effectively monetize video and audio content distributed across all digital platforms for the business genre.

EN is partnered with hundreds of top YouTube channels in the business vertical and provides partners with distribution on Entrepreneur.com as well as our apps on Amazon Fire, Roku and Apple TV.

Click here to become a part of this growing video network.

http://j.mp/2fArLgI via Entrepreneur: Latest Articles URL : http://j.mp/2fzIDYF

#News

0 notes