Author: smartpeopleiknow

How online retailers end up selling outrageous and appalling products

I’ve seen many instances where a sudden outrage occurs because some ecommerce site like Amazon or some T shirt store ends up selling some product which an outrageous message on it. People will howl: how could they choose to do something so stupid? This article gives a good explanation of just how such stupidity occurs: How Amazon Ended Up With Auschwitz Christmas Ornaments for Sale | WIRED

In a nutshell, things are automated to the point that many of these platforms take on products with little if no review. The cost of review would be much much higher than the occasional cost of having to deal with these exceptions. Given that, expect more and more of this to occur until some legislation comes into play.

 

Beware of a new variation of phishing email

A simple way of determining if an email is a phishing attempt is to move your mouse over the link(s) in it to see if they match what is on your screen. For example, if you get an email from Apple that says:

Use this link https://applid.apple.com to verify your account

You might move your mouse over the URL and see that the link is to company https://phishingRUs.com/ or something else.

But what if the URL is a URL shortening site, like http://bit.ly or http://dlvr.it/?

My advice: assume it is a phishing attack. It could be the real company, but most large organizations will not do this. (And if they do, they need to at least be explicit about it in the URL).

My general advice: if you are not sure or uncomfortable, assume it is spam or phishing and delete it.

If you feel overwhelmed at Christmas but still want to decorate – minimalist decorating


Then consider this idea from Apartment Therapy: Fresh Christmas Garland Home Decor Idea.

Basically just get some garland (and a tree) and keep it simple. If you have a bit more energy, candles are a good idea. Or small LED light chains in a vase with some Christmas balls.

But the garland (and the tree) signify the holiday season quite nicely.

Why I post mostly random nonsense on Twitter (as opposed to trying to influence the world with my tweets)

Many years ago I gave up on the notion of having any form of influence using Twitter, either as an individual or as part of a bigger force united by some such thing as a tag. Indeed, I gave up on the idea of using Twitter for anything other than sharing things with the few people who engage with me at all on this site.

I don’t think I can accomplish much of anything positive on this site. Anything I do share has a life span of 18 minutes on average (see below). For the few people who follow me and engage with me, that life span is likely longer. I know there are people who read tweets posted hours or even a day earlier. But those people are exceptions. Exceptions I appreciate!

Occasionally I share something and it gets shared by someone with more followers, but that rarely gets me more followers or other forms of engagement. It’s something odd to note and move on.

I treat this site as a coffee shop I wander into from time to time. I overhear some distorted form of the news, I get some weird opinions. From time to time I hear something brilliant. Often I’ll laugh at something odd or funny. Then I log out. This site is no longer the Cafe Central in Vienna, with Trotsky in the corner plotting revolution. If it ever was.

Besides, I am aware that there are people here who do try to use the site to foment small bursts of unrest and unhappiness. Why encourage that in any way?

If you still believe or witness positive change happening because of your engagement here, then that’s great. I suspect for the vast number of people updating statuses and reading them, that does not occur.

As far as mediums go, I still like it. I have given up on most other social media, save this and Instagram and my blog. I still get some social engagement from this and Instagram, which keeps me coming back. And Instagram and my blog are good ways to leave a record (something twitter is pretty poor at doing).

So if you wonder why I post mostly random nonsense on Twitter (as opposed to trying to influence the world), now you know.

P.S. Regarding the lifespan of a tweet:

Tweets have the shortest lifespan of any social media post, about 18 minutes. And there’s not much you can do about it. Twitter is fast-paced, and messages get buried more quickly. The newest algorithm  means that posts are no longer displayed chronologically, so yours might live a little longer, but your tweet will still get pushed down the page quickly.

via What Is The Lifespan Of Social Media Posts? – Epipheo

Thinking of getting a SmartTV?

Then read this:  How Smart TVs in Millions of U.S. Homes Track More Than What’s On Tonight – The New York Times.

It’s a year old, but I highly doubt the problem has gone away.  You may want to consider at least not buying from the brands listed. You may even go as far as having your TV unplugged when not watching it.  For more tips, see this.

What is the Internet?


I have long ranted against people who confuse the Internet with the (World Wide) Web or social media or basically the part of the Internet they are familiar with.

Well now I no longer have to rant. I can just point people to this: The internet, explained – Vox.

The writers are Vox have done a fine job of explaining what the Internet is. Take a few minutes and read it. I’ve been on the Internet since the late 80s (email was the main use back then).  While it is constantly evolving, the fundamental aspects of the Internet don’t change much. Read that piece and you will be good for a few decades.

 

Kubernetes Is the Future of Computing?

I hesitate to echo Barron’s here: Kubernetes Is the Future of Computing. Everything You Should Know. – Barron’s because computing is vast, and there is more to computing than Kubernetes. (AI, for one thing.) But Kubernetes is one of the main drivers of change in IT, and more and more people are moving towards it. If you don’t know much about it and you subscribe to Barron’s, I recommend you read their piece. Otherwise Google “kubernetes for business leaders” or “Kubernetes 101” and you’ll find quite a few good pieces on it.

This Decorating Technique Separates the Pros from the Amateurs

It’s a very simple idea:

“It’s all about the procession,” said Andrew Franz, an architect and interior designer in New York. As soon as you enter a home, he believes, your eye should be led to another visual destination, “because the activity between rooms is what creates a successful, comfortable design.”

via This Decorating Technique Separates the Pros from the Amateurs – WSJ

It doesn’t have to be color either: it could be pattern, style, material…anything that links the rooms. In linking rooms, you make each room appear stronger while making the space feel unified.

Image from the article, where the colors in each of the rooms are linked to each other.

An alternative way to get stronger that is both counter-intuitive and something you could use

The alternative is explained here: How to ‘Grease the Groove’ and Exercise Easy – The Atlantic.

If you don’t know anything about getting stronger, you should read this. You should also read it if you are someone who knows about sets, reps, leg day, and other such things. It may not be the way to reach peak bodybuilding, but it could be just the thing for people who can’t seem to find a good way to get stronger.

Questions to ask your parents before they die are not just for parents

This is a good piece, and the list of questions here are certainly ones you’d like to have answers to: Questions to ask your parents before they die – Rossalyn Warren – Medium

I have a book called The Parents Book and it is has even more questions like this. I have not filled it out, but I really want to. Chances are my kids would want to have answers to some of these things. Family members would likely want that too. Regardless of whether or not you are a parent, or not, consider answering a list like this and put it with your Will and other essential documents. Your loved ones will be glad you did.

Strategic Voting in Canada – some thoughts

First off, there are sites like this one that claim to help you if you want to decrease the chances of a more right wing politician winng election in a specific riding: Strategic Voting 2019 Canadian Federal Election | don’t make a statement, make a difference.

You can use the site that way. But I’d argue you can use it another way. If you want to vote non-strategically, you can look at the site to see who is likely to win and then use that to vote for the party you prefer (assuming you are considering more than one). If you are unsure whether or not to vote NDP or Green, you might choose to vote Green and boost their vote count if you are pretty certain the NDP is going to win. Likewise, if you are a right of centre voter and you think there is either a strong chance or no chance the Conservatives will win, then you may feel more strongly to vote for the Conservatives.

Of course you don’t have to do any of those things. You can vote for your preferred party. You can vote for your preferred candidate. You can cast a protest vote for a more extreme party knowing it is unlikely they won’t win but as a way to indicate your displeasure.  Vote how you think best. It is your vote, and you can use your vote to participate in the electoral process the best way you know how.

Falling

We don’t talk much about poverty anymore. We talk about the middle class a lot. We don’t talk about the upper class or the rich anymore: instead we talk about them in terms of percentage points. And we don’t talk about the poor as much as we talk about those who are homeless. But there are still poor people in our society, and one member of that group wrote about it here: Falling.

He has a home, he was middleclass, and now he is poor. The story is sad but not exceptional.

I don’t know why we don’t talk about the poor so much any more. Perhaps we see poverty as shameful, not for the people who are poor, but shameful for people who don’t see themselves as poor. I don’t know. I think we do need to talk about it and the spectrum of financial status, and I think we need to work towards a fairer and more equitable society. First, we need to look and talk about it more clearly.

When the homeless man is your son

I have read this often and think of it frequently, especially given my current status:  First Person: When the homeless man is your son – Orange County Register.

It’s a really good piece, and something you either don’t think about or don’t want to think about as a parent. Sometimes the world chews up the thing you love and try to care for, a tornado that comes through and destroys what you love, despite your best efforts. Tornados and other tragedies know nothing of your virtues and care nothing for the love you show.

Is China’s government ever going to grow up?


I have thought a lot about this piece since I read it: Is China’s government ever going to grow up? – The Washington Post Key quote from it:

.. the sad truth is that as China rises, instead of embracing a superpower mindset and growing a thicker skin, it is becoming increasingly more sensitive to perceived slights — all while it fosters a thin-skinned, resentful nationalism among its people.

I wonder why China is so thin-skinned and taking action against any one doing the slight thing (e.g. favouring a tweet). It is the response of a weak country or a bully, not a strong one. China is a strong nation: it should act like one.

Thinking about work (especially if you are not motivated)

If you don’t feel like working this Monday, you can at least read some pieces about work that might help you get motivated.

A trick to resolve issues with YAML files for Kubernetes

I was going through this exercise for Using Calico network policies to block traffic when I thought that instead of deploying the webserver image using this command:

kubectl run webserver --image=k8s.gcr.io/echoserver:1.10 --replicas=3

I would create a yaml file to deploy the webserver instead. Unfortunately, there was something about my yaml file that preventing things from working. That’s when I came across this trick.

  • Step 1: deploy the web server using the kubectl run command.
  • Step 2:  run the following command to get the YAML back for the deployment


kubectl get deployment webserver --output yaml > webserver.yaml

  • Step 3: edit the webserver.yaml file to remove extra lines. For me, I was able to remove:
    •  the status section
    • the annotations section
    • the strategy section
    • etc.

And just keep the following lines (note, note formatted properly):


apiVersion: extensions/v1beta1
kind: Deployment
metadata:
labels:
run: webserver
name: webserver
namespace: default
spec:
replicas: 3
selector:
matchLabels:
run: webserver
template:
metadata:
labels:
run: webserver
spec:
containers:
- image: k8s.gcr.io/echoserver:1.10
name: webserver

Now, you do not have to edit the file. But I think this is cleaner than the full version that comes back.

So you can delete the deployment that was the result of the command line and instead build future deployments using the yaml file.

Even weekend exercisers get to live longer

Image of person running

Hard to believe, but according to this:

Working out only on the weekends or otherwise compressing your total physical activity into one or two prolonged runs or a single vigorous basketball or soccer game each week could lessen your risks of dying prematurely almost as effectively as more frequent, shorter workouts spread throughout the week, according to an interesting new study of the so-called weekend warrior phenomenon.

So you had a bad week and never hit the gym once. Don’t despair: sneak a weekend workout in and do yourself a favour.

The greatest thing Obama did

Is the one thing about the Obama legacy that can’t be repealed. Namely this:

There is no mystery about Barack Obama’s greatest presidential achievement: He stopped the Great Recession from becoming the second Great Depression.

Obama did many important things, Obamacare being the obvious. As someone who had seen many failed attempts at achieving this, to see him team with Pelosi and others to achieve this was astounding.

That said, there would have been nothing accomplished by Obama if the US spiralled into a second Great Depression, dragging down the world economy with it. I continue to see criticism of the actions taken by his team then, especially among progressives. They argue that more should have been done. You can google “Obama terrible” and find pieces like this.

Time will tell, but so far Obama is holding up as anything but terrible. I predict he will rise in Presidential standing in the future. Meanwhile, the world is in much better shape due to the actions he took in the early stages of his presidency to avert worldwide economic disaster.

How to learn physics, via Susan Fowler

Susan is famous now (for good reason!), but before she was famous, she wrote this excellent blog post:  If Susan Can Learn Physics, So Can You — Susan Fowler.

I came across it because I was trying to learn physics again. (I started off taking physics ages ago but dropped it because, well, long story, but I ended up in Computer Science and Mathematics and went on to have a career at IBM so it worked out.) I followed a lot of Susan’s advice, and while I am not good at physics yet, I highly recommend this to anyone serious about it. (Just stay away from programs that want to weed out most of the class because they want small class sizes.)

(Image via Susan’s blog)

A good profile on Jimmy Carter, who is 95 years young today


This recent piece in the Washington Post is a reminder what a good man and what an under appreciated President that Jimmy Carter was: The un-celebrity president: Jimmy Carter shuns riches, lives modestly in his Georgia hometown – The Washington Post.

He was dealt a bad hand a number of times, but he achieved greatness too. His greatest deed may have been to allow the United States to transition from the debacle that was the Nixon Presidency.  Like Obama with the Great Recession, he saved the country from those that would harm it.

Links for self publishing authors

If you’ve ever thought about self publishing but didn’t know where to start, this can help.

  1. How to Self-Publish a Book: the first thing you need to know
  2. How to Format a Book in 6 Powerful Steps • Ebook Formatting: how to format it
  3. What Does It Take To Be A “Bestselling Author”? $3 and 5 Minutes. | Observer: how to (cynically) promote it
  4. Russell Smith: Self-published authors may be no worse off than the rest of us – The Globe and Mail: why it’s not a bad idea
  5. Make-Your-Own Cookbook: Dinner: not really about self-publishing as it is about making your own personal cookbook via the NYTimes

What’s happening with Midcentury Modern Design


According to this, the interest in this style of furniture may be slowly fading:
Is Interest in Midcentury Modern Design Declining?

I’m not surprised. Revivals all have their rise and falls, and this style of furniture is overdue. Likely it won’t totally fade, since so many pieces of that era really blend in well with other styles of furnishing. It’s just likely you won’t see whole rooms dedicated to the style.

You’ve heard of Pompeii and Troy, but have you heard of the lost city of Merv?


If not, then you might want to read of the city that was wiped out by Genghis Khan with the result of 700,000 deaths. That’s a gruesome statistic, but this is a fascinating story:  Lost cities #5: how the magnificent city of Merv was razed – and never recovered | Cities | The Guardian.

It’s part of a series on Lost Cities, which includes Troy and Pompeii and much more.

Thinking about how topics of interest change


I was thinking about how topics of interest change when I came across this link I had saved since 2016: Should we have intervened in Syria? I don’t know – and neither do most armchair generals.

Back when Obama was president, whether or not the US should intervene in Syria was a hot topic. Articles like this struggled with whether or not something should be done about it. It was hard not to think about, both because it was terrible and because there was alot of media devoted to it.

Then Trump became President. Suddenly everything shifted. Terrible things went on in Syria, but it was no longer a topic of interest in much of North America.  I confess I barely know what is going on there now.

It’s a good reminder to me how much of what I think about is driven by who ever can get information in front of you. And it’s also a reminder of why disinformation campaigns will get stronger and stronger.

I don’t know what the answer is. I just know I have to constantly remind myself that just because it appears something is important or unimportant, my ability to assess that is shaped very much by others. There may be topics I spend a lot of time thinking about and researching. But most of the time, and for most people, that is not possible.

The iPod Touch lives!


And as someone who is a fan of it since a long time, I was glad to hear about it here:  There’s a New iPod Touch. Yes, in 2019, and Yes, It’s Worth Looking at. – The New York Times

Back in the day when Blackberries were the rage and I needed one for work, the iPod Touch was my way of tapping into the world of Apple. Today if I had to use Android for whatever reason, I’d be inclined to get a Touch again, just so I could do things the Apple way. It’s a great device still, and if you read the article, you’ll see it is not obsolete.

Now if Apple would only bring back the Nano! 🙂