Even Sophie the dog wears a mask against Coronavirus.
– If giver doesn’t wear mask and receiver does – 70% chance of transmission
– If giver wears mask and receiver doesn’t – 5% chance of transmission
– If giver wears mask and receiver wears mask – 1.5% chance of transmission
That’s doggie good statistics to avoid the Coronavirus plague.
People can learn just like dogs. 😉
(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
I love when people can communicate through pictures effectively.
Truly, a picture is worth a thousand words–probably more.
This was a simple drawing to depict I assume global warming.
– 2000 some nice mountain glaciers.
– 2020 the snow is melted.
It’s like the person didn’t have to say a word.
But I get it.
Also, I know there is supposedly a lot of scientific evidence for global warming.
But for me personally, I don’t see it or feel it.
The summers, if anything, feel cooler and the Winters feel colder to me.
I know that is anecdotal and not representative of the world.
However, it is hard to reconcile what the scientists say, when your own eyes aren’t seeing it.
Granted, I’m not in Alaska where, for example, the glaciers are melting,
Still wouldn’t we be feeling something here?
Maybe a few degrees really isn’t perceptible.
I guess time will tell us for certain.
Hopefully, by the time we do see it, we won’t get run over by the speeding train. 😉
(Credit Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
So I heard this interesting perspective on information and data analytics…
Basically, it comes down to this:
“Most organizations are data rich, but information/insight poor.”
Or put another way:
“Data is collected, but not used.”
Hence we don’t know what we don’t know and we end up making bad decisions based on poor information.
Just imagine if we could actually make sense of all the data points, connect them, visualize them, and get good information from them.
How much better than a pile of rocks is that?
(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
So I have started watching VICE News and you should too.
It is on HBO and is superior to the other big news outlets in so many ways.
The intensity and clarity of their photography and videos is unbelievable!
My daughter said to me:
“This is clearer than REAL life!”
And she was right…I don’t know how they do it.
Also, they remove all the clutter from the news screen that CNN, MSNBC, and others use at the top and bottom of the screen–instead it’s just clean, focused, and right to the news point.
VICE puts the key messages in callouts right on the screen in large and easy to read boxes–the impact is you see the visual and the print message dramatically together and you get it and remember it!
They do this for their photos and videos.
Finally, with all the “talk is cheap” news these days, it is nice that VICE seems to focus more on reporting and less on subjective opinion.
With all the failing, fake, and alternative news out there, it is nice to see that someone has invented a better news program. 😉
(Source Photo: Vice News)
I read about this amazing “Spiritual Communications Board” that Chaplain Joel Nightingale Berning invented for New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Medical Center.
The board allows hospital patients who are intubated or otherwise can’t talk to communicate their spiritual health and needs.
The top part allows the person to say what religion they are.
The bottom left, are choices for how they feel from afraid and lonely, to nervous, helpless, and hopeless, and even to identify on a scale of 0 to 10, the level of their spiritual pain.
And on the bottom right, they can point to ask for spiritual help… from a prayer, song, or blessing to talk with me, sit with me, get my family or hold my hand.
While hospitals have traditionally been focused on getting a person, with G-d’s help, physically healthy again, it is wonderful to see people, like Chaplain Berning looking after the spiritual side of patients wellness and health as well.
To heal, people don’t just need surgeries and medicines, but they need to deal with all the emotions and pain surrounding their condition and their challenging life situations, and this is something that spiritual caregivers can make a huge difference with.
The health of the soul and the body are linked in more ways than one. 😉
(Source Photo: here with attribution to Chaplain Berning)
I took this photo of this Design logo on the side of a bag this guy was carrying.
It is from the Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum in NYC (and if I am ever back in town there, I’d like to go there).
I like this logo a lot…everything from DE*SIGN to all the descriptions of design and why it’s so important to us.
– “Design is art people use.” (Design is artisitic and creative)
– “Design is communication.” (A picture is worth a thousand words)
– “Design is the stuff around us.” (It’s practical and functional)
– “Design is a verb.” (Design is something we do from coming up with the concept to creating the end product)
– “Design is systems.” (Design is how we format and package and is integral to making the content easy to use and come alive)
– “Design is a way of thinking.” (Design is big-picture thinking that connects the dots)
– “Design is problem-solving.” (Design uses visualization to understand and think through process and problems).
A good designer is invaluable and design is absolutely cool. 😉
(Source Photo: Andy Blumenthal)
I really like this poster graphic outlining Jewish history and key figures from Genesis until modern times.
While there is already a lot of information on here such major events in Jewish history, world events, Jewish historical figures, Jewish literature and Jewish population, I would suggest adding major Jewish contributions to the world from Einstein to Freud, from Columbis to Salk.
Also, I found that 23% of all Nobel Prizes (or 193 people) between 1901 and 2013 were awarded to people of Jewish descent–and the awards were across the fields of chemistry, economics, literature, peace, physics, and medicine.
We are not a very large people–just .2%–in terms of population, but we have a very rich history–a mixture of persecution and contribution.
Thank you Minna Blumenthal for sending me the link to this!
(Source Photo: here with attribution to Odyeda)
Flowcharts have been used for quite some time for visualizing and organizing business processes and making them more efficient (e.g. business process reengineering).
Now flowcharts are being used to build and link reusable programming code.
NoFlo or Flow-Based Programming (FBP) simplifies application development by using libraries of pre-written code and then dragging and dropping them into your process flows.
This leverages objected-oriented programming (OOP) and uses modules of open-source code, which are linked together to create a full program that solves a business problem.
The flowchart helps to avoid spaghetti code by providing for a more organized, modular, object-based development environment.
These flowcharts can not only be a collaborative tool where developers can build or map code, but can also be part of the systems documentation that ensures a higher-level of understanding of the total programming solution.
NoFlo raised over $100K on Kickstarter in 45 days in order to advance this project from Javascript to iOS, Android, and Python platforms as well.
To me, this programming paradigm seems to have real legs:
– A process-based model for decomposing solutions
– Simple information visualization through a common flowcharting toolset, and
– Reusable object code from programming libraries in the cloud.
I’d say YesFLo–this makes a lot of programming sense. 😉
To commemorate 46 years since the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was passed on July 4, 1966, the Project on Government Oversight (POGO) came out with a infographic showing the significant progress that has been made in government transparency and areas they still see for possible improvement.
Similarly, Government Executive Magazine ran an feature article in June 2012 called “The Truth Behind Transparency,” calling progress with open government as “tough to gauge.”
The basic idea of FOIA as the website for Sunshine Week put it is: “the public’s right to know about its government.”
Obviously, as GovExec points out, one of the main questions over the years with FOIA is “how quickly and fully do agencies respond to FOIA requests?”
To much and too soon, and do you perhaps put at risk various sensitive information, jeopardizing elements of the functioning of government itself?
Too little and too late, and then is the opportunity for mismanagement, waste, fraud, and abuse simply an after fact?
As Beth Novek, former deputy chief technology officer for open government, described it, open government is a “shorthand for open innovation or the idea that working in a transparent, participatory, and collaborative fashion helps improve performance, inform decision-making, encourage entrepreneurship and solve problems more effectively.”
Transparency can aid in accountability by shedding a light on leadership and its performance management. It can also be a great opportunity to bring new ideas and opinions to the fold, perhaps leading to better decisions and results, at the end of the day, for all.
The challenge for government is to guard against any information risks to the safety and security of our nation.
An informed nation, is a stronger nation–to me, it is a foundation of a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.”
Government and the people working together, duly informed, to confront our toughest challenges and solve our greatest problems.
Here is a really nice technology forecast visualization from Envisioning Technology.
It covers almost three decades from 2012 through 2040.
And includes an exhaustive list of technology categories for the following:
– Artificial Intelligence
– Internet
– Interfaces
– Sensors
– Ubiquitous Computing
– Robotics
– Biotechnology
– Materials
– Energy
– Space
– Geoengineering
Further, specific technologies are informed by their:
– Relative Importance–by bubble size
– Consumer Impact–by size of the node’s outline
– Related Clusters–by a jagged edge
Additionally, what I really like about their online version is that when you hover a technology, you get a decent description of what it is.
Looking in the out-years, it was great to see cool innovations such as machine-augmented cognition, retinal screens, space-based solar power, programmable matter, and anti-aging drugs–so we’ll be overall smarter, more connected, exist in a more energized and malleable society, and live long-enough to appreciate it all. 😉
andyblumenthal 