Author: smartpeopleiknow

It’s Monday. Your Windows computer sucks. Here’s how to make it less sucky!

First, take this list: 25 tricks to make working with Windows faster, better and more fun.

Second, apply as many as you can. Even if you aren’t technically savvy or comfortable with changing things, look through the long list and find some you are comfortable with and apply them.

Third, ask for help with the ones you can’t do (either because you aren’t comfortable or their are restrictions regarding what you can change on your computer).

There! Your computer is better and less sucky already. And a less sucky computer means a less sucky work week.

Good luck! Thank me later! 🙂 Also thank ITBusiness, which is where I found it.

Are you dreading going to work tomorrow? Maybe the problem is your work location


There are lots of reasons to dread going to work, from the work itself to the commute to and from. While I can’t help you with all of that, if you live in Toronto and you have flexible working locations, I highly recommend this list from blogTO: The top 10 places to work or study in Toronto. (If you don’t live in Toronto, check it out for ideas and then look for similar places in your city.)

If you find yourself cooped up in your home or from force of habit going to the same ole same ole coffee shop, go through that list and aim to work at different spots. Working at a new and better spot should help alleviate some of that negative feeling you have towards your workday.

P.S. One place not on this top 10 list is the Toronto Reference Library (seen in the photo). It’s a great spot to work from. I like the top floors with great views overlooking the city. Also free wifi. Did I mention Balzac’s coffee shop on the ground floor? All the things you need to be productive in a good setting.

Should you go to (film) school? Some brief thoughts on education

If you read this Open Culture post, Director Robert Rodriguez Teaches The Basics of Filmmaking in Under 10 Minutes, you’d be inclined to say “no”. As for me, I appreciate the points raised in the piece. Much of directed learning in school is less than valuable. That said, there are many ways to learn: experience, reading and watching how others do things, schools and teachers. The idea of limiting yourself to one way of learning is to deprive yourself unnecessarily. Learn any which way you can.

Beautifying the dreadful rental closet door

If you live in a high rise apartment, you likely have big sliding doors hiding clothes in your closet. It’s bland at best. (That’s being kind.) If you want to tackle this and make it into something more attactive, then go here and steal some ideas: 5 DIY Ways to Upgrade Rental Closet Doors — Renters Solutions | Apartment Therapy.

By the way, I highly recommend Apartment Therapy and Renters Solutions for people in apartments that want to make the space look more attactive. It can be done! 🙂

A fantastic story: how Andrew Hyde Hosted 138 Dinners in a Year

I love this. Andrew Hyde made a decision. He decided

to cook dinner for people. A year later I’ve hosted 138 dinners. The average dinner had 14 guests which means I’ve made 1932 dinners for friends and strangers.

I highly recommend this post of his describing it:  Dinner At My House (How I Hosted 138 Dinners in a Year) by Andrew Hyde. It makes me want to try and do something similar.

Some thoughts on mining twitter for art

There was a lot of talk when Cory Archangel published the book above.  Essentially it is a collection of tweets from others tweeting about…well, working on their novel! It’s clever, but it made me think that it is just the beginning of works of arts that could be mined from the colossal amount of tweets each day.  There’s gold in there amongst all the twitter rage and minutiae about people’s day. It deserves better.

Meanwhile, more about that book, here: A Novel Compiled From Crowd Sourced Tweets About Writing A Novel | MAKE.

Marketers! Here’s a way to get extremely valuable ad space for next to nothing

How? Use this idea from this great food blog, Chocolate & Zucchini. What Caroline Mignot has done is create attractive monthly calendars for people to use as their desktop background.

Think about this: what is the one thing people stare at up to 40 hours a week or longer? That’s right: their computer! Most people have not so great backgrounds. Make them an attractive one with some message you want to communicate and you will have them thinking about it all the time.

Add pattern to your walls and floor (and every where else)

Paint may be the easiest and cheapest way to change the look of your place (even if you are rich, getting a designer to do it is more work than you think…trust me). But paint shouldn’t be the only thing you try. Rugs are also an option. While they can seem expensive, places like IKEA have them for well under $100.

Paint and rugs aside, there’s wallpaper. You don’t have to cover the whole room: you can do a backsplash, a closet, a ceiling, even part of a wall. Also, wall paper is alot more varied both in patterns and material than you might suppose. You can get wall paper for any where.

If you are nervous about wallpaper, consider the paint rollers from The Painted House. You get beautiful patterns that you can apply as easily as paint, because it is painting.

That said, I would encourage you to try wallpaper. It definitely helps to have two people do it, as well as having patience. Try and make it a social event. The results are worth it.

Unconvinced? See this: Subtle Yet Striking: 5 Understated Ways to Use Wallpaper | Apartment Therapy.

Thinking and thinking better about scarcity (time, money, love, etc.)

We all suffer from scarcity. If you are poor, this is a given. But there are other types of scarcity too, including scarcity of time and even scarcity of affection. Regardless of the form it comes in, it affects you in ways you might not expect and prevents you from making the better choices. This book, Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much, explorers scarcity from all these angles, and it made me realize the effect scarcity has on me. People think they can rationalize in the face of scarcity, but as the authors argue, it is much harder to do than we think. I highly recommend it. (It comes across as a book in the business book genre, but it is much better than that.)

Part of the problem resulting from dealing with scarcity is that we adopt a scarcity mindset. I do that sometimes, either by choice or out of ignorance. (e.g. “You mean I have many choices? I thought I had only one choice?” If you ask yourself questions like that, you may have a scarcity mindset.) It would help if there were ways to dealing with this.

One way of dealing with it is in this article: From the Scarcity Mindset to the Abundance Mindset at The Simple Dollar. It gives you some ways to avoid the scarcity mindset and move towards a mindset of abundance. Try the article: you’ll be surprised, I believe, just how often you assume a mindset of scarcity. You will also have to work at having a mindset of abundance, but it is worth the effort.

Finally, I don’t mean to trivialize people’s real needs and lack of resources they have to fill them. I do think we often make matters worse because of the way we think about what we have and what we could have. This book and this article can help with this.

You can get the book from book sellers like indigo.ca.

How to give a great — exceptionally great — presentation?

Follow the steps that Marc Ensign outlines here: The Tale of Inspiration, Perspiration, Preparation and Celebration.

I am convinced that people who give a great presentation do it because they put this much into the presentation. For people who give so-so to good presentations, including myself, you likely just manage to get it done. For people who give great presentations, they do all the things that Marc outlines here.

If you are wondering is it worth it, I can say that it is. I have given a small number of really good presentations, and every time I have, they were good because I went through a process similar to Marc’s. What strikes me is that years later, I am still happy and proud to think of those talks that I gave.  That’s what makes me think it’s worth  doing all of the things that Marc talks about.

Needless to say, I highly recommend this advice and Marc’s piece. Bonus: he’s funny.

Add colour to your room: no paint required

While there are lots of great rooms that consist only of neutrals, I think every room benefits from bright colours. If you can’t paint your walls — and many people who rent cannot do that — there are ways to get around that, as this article shows: Put Down the Paintbrush: 10 Ways to Add Color Without Painting — Renters Solutions | Apartment Therapy. Some require more require more work than others. Others, like in the photo above, just require some a book shelf, coloured paper and adhesive. (If you are stuck for coloured paper, go to a place that sells sheets of wrapping paper.)

Sofas online and on sale

Shopping for sofas is a pain, I think. But I was looking into them and came across this: Bargain Alert! 10 Stylish Sofas on Sale Now at Apartment Therapy. The prices are good, the styles are varied and should appeal to many, and best of all, many of the places featued deliver.

If you are in the market for a sofa, check it out.

(The sofa above is Fog Kendall Sofa from World Market; was $699, now $549.)

 

Resources for people wanting to start getting into coding

My daughter asked me for good on line resources for people interested in learning about programming. I’ve collected a number of them here. If you know of any more, please let me know.

  • Code School and Codecademy are both well done sites that teach the basics of programming. I’ve used Codecademy and liked it alot. People say good things about Code School too.  For example, at Code School they came up with this fun way to learn Rails: Rails for Zombies.
  • Code.org is another highly publicized site that teaches programming, though it seems aimed more at younger people. Still, a good site:  Code.org
  • Other good sites I found were The hard way to Learn Python and The Hard Way to Learn Ruby. I honestly didn’t find them that hard. For people who find the other sites I mentioned too slow or not for them, try “the hard way” sites.
  • If you want to focus more on HTML and CSS, then there are good tutorials on HTML, CSS, and more here: W3Schools Online Web Tutorials. I have a big fan of w3Schools for a long time. There’s also this: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript Tutorials, References, and Articles over at HTML Dog. As well, the other sites mentioned above have lessons on HTML, etc.
  • There are tons of  of programming references here -> Become a Programmer, M—–F—–. (Yeah, that word is what you think it is. Still, that site has alot of great links.)
  • What language should you learn? Well, here are the top 10 languages of 2014, according to Mashable. It really depends on alot of things, but I think you can’t go wrong learning Javascript, then maybe Ruby or Python. Some SQL is good to know.  But hey, I still use Perl and PHP. Java and C have their strengths. If someone made me choose one, right now, it would be Javascript.
  • Last, but not least by any means is a great story for anyone learning to program but is worried about it.  So How Did You Learn How to Program? : A Cubicle Of My Own. I highly recommend this to anyone who thinks “I really want to code and use computers” but is put off by the culture or the attitude of other programmers or for any reason is thinking that they can’t do it. You can. Really. Give it a try.

Two takes on robots that stem from one fact

Take 1: Over at Make,  A Peek Into the Design of The Robot Anyone Can Afford | MAKE.

Take 2: Over at Kottke is a good post on why we shouldn’t be blase about robots replacing us (Humans need not apply).

The one fact is that as microprocessors get small, cheaper, and faster, the ability to make robots gets easier and cheaper. That means more people can experiment with them, from individuals to corporations. Soon robots will be ubiquitous, just like personal computers and now smart phones are ubiquitous.  And just like now there are fewer and fewer jobs without computers  or smart phones involved, soon there will be few jobs without robots involved.

I don’t think this will result in robots taking all the jobs. My belief is that there will be a mix of robots and people doing work for some time to come, rather than just robots replacing people. But robots in work and play and all aspects of our lives in inevitable and coming soon. (Depending on your work day, you may not see this as a bad thing.)

 

The typical American room, and incidentally, the importance of home decor

This is not a typical American room:

No, not because of the actors in it. It’s not typical because it is interesting. It is packed with things to capture the eye. It is a “typical” room to an art director of a TV show.

To see and think about the typical American (and Canadian) room, I highly recommend this piece, The American Room — The Message — Medium. The author takes a number of YouTube videos to explore the typical American room and what it means. It sounds potentially boring, but I found it thought provoking.

I think home decor is important. The furniture you choose, the pictures you hang, and the color of the walls you choose are important. It stimulates the mind and gets you to think about yourself, your world, and your  life. I read once that the great artist Ferdinand Leger painted his floor red because he wanted it to stimulate him to produce better art. You need to live in rooms that make you better.  The typical room discussed in the article has none of that.

Here’s me hoping you strive to furnish your home in a way to gives you a better life.

Billy Bragg and David Byrne on streaming and music

David Byrne kicked off the discussion on music streaming with a long and thoughtful post. Billy Bragg picked up on that and replied with an equally long and thoughtput post, fround here (Streaming Debate: Billy Bragg’s Response To Byrne’s ‘How Will The Wolf Survive…’ — MusicTank.). I highly encourage anyone who is interested in music, the music business, or music and IT to read both of these.

If you go to the Billy Bragg link, you’ll also get to see a link to David Byrne.

 

Technology that matters: Andrew Bastawrous’s Visionary App

Andrew Bastawrous has developed Portable Eye Examination Kit, or PEEK, a combination of app and clip-on hardware that allows a smartphone to become a portable optical clinic. How significant is this? To do this type of procedure from a state-of-the-art hospital, you need $160,000 plus skilled staff to run it. PEEK costs about $500 and needs one eye specialist in the field with some training.

It’s a great invention. You can read more about it here:  Andrew Bastawrous’s Visionary App | Rising Stars | OZY

Thoughts on bread making, technical (tips for new bakers from a new baker)

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I’ve been planning on making bread for…well, years. I made it decades ago, but for various reasons, I never got back into the habit of making it. The last time I tried was after I picked up the book “Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day” and hoped to jump on the no knead bandwagon. But the boule I made wasn’t very good and the book and my bread making went back on the shelf.

Two things happened to me recently to give it another go. First, I found a new copy of “The All New Purity Cook Book”. This book is the one I grew up with, and it is heavily oriented towards bread making. An old cook book, but a great one. Second, I wandered into a store and found a Black and Decker refurbished bread maker for a $29. I decided it was time to try making some bread again. You can see my results above. (And yes, the shapes are off, but hey, I am learning, just like you will be!)

Veteran bread makers won’t learn much from my notes below, but new bread makers might. Things I learned:

  1. Of the three approaches, the bread machine is the easiest. Not surprising. What I also learned is that the no knead and the traditional way are also not so hard. But the bread machine is still simplest. If you are feeling a bit courageous, skip buying the machine and try the other methods.
  2. I had fresh flour and fresh yeast: both are cheap, and if you aren’t sure how fresh yours are, I suggest you get some new stuff. Stale yeast and flour that is old and off will make it hard if not impossible to make good bread.
  3. I used to fret over water temperature and air temperature when I used to make bread, but this time I relaxed and just made sure the water was not hot and not cool, and didn’t worry if the temperature was 110F or some exact measure. It still worked. Likewise, for a warm place, I just stuck the bread in the microwave to rise. It was fine. I didn’t have to worry: the house wasn’t drafty or cool, but the microwave works well if it is drafty or cool in your place (or you have excessive AC, maybe?) Of course, don’t turn on the microwave while the dough is in there.
  4. My bread maker made a lot of noise at first and moved around a fair bit on the counter. Be careful not to have it too near the edge, and if all bread makers are as noisy as my refurb, don’t put it on before you go to bed.
  5. There’s not much to making bread maker bread, but follow the instructions. I made an exception for seasonings they wanted to add to the bread. I skipped those. But when it comes to water, oil, sugar and salt, flour and yeast, stick to the recipe.
  6. It didn’t call for it, but I brushed some butter on the bread after I took it out of the oven. It looks better in my opinion.
  7. As far a the five minute artisan bread, I messed it up the first time I tried it today. I tried it again, though. First, I halved the ingredients in the book for the master recipe. This was fine. Second, the trick to blending the flour into the water is to measure out the flour and slowly add it before you add more. The first time I more or less dumped it in and the dough was very difficult to work with. Also, the water ratio they use seems to be a bit slight. There’s always more flour then I can blend. I ran luke warm water, wet my hands, then mixed the loose flour in. It took me a few goes at this before I managed to incorporate all the loose flower into the dough. Without that extra water from my hands, I couldn’t get all the flour blended.
  8. The other benefit of halving the ingredients is that you have less bread in your fridge. It takes very little to mix up a new batch and my fridge is small and I don’t have room for all the dough they make with their recipe. If you are the same situation, chop the recipe quantities in half.
  9. The authors of the no knead bread recipe stress kosher salt: I used plain old table salt and it worked fine.
  10. Other than the things I mentioned, the no knead approach works great and the bagette I made was delicious: slightly chewy on the outside and nice a tender on the inside. I like the bread maker, but if you wanted easy bread, I highly recommend that book.
  11. Finally, I did the traditional approach and made the challah bread. There’s a few more steps, but it’s still really easy, right up to the part where you braid it. The braiding is not easy but the recipe itself is easy: you just need time.
  12. Rather than type in the recipe I used, I recommend this recipe because of the highly detailed description of how to braid the bread.  My recipe had all the same ingredients and steps. Two exception: 1) in my recipe, after the dough has risen for 1.5 hours, I punched it down to deflate it and then formed six equal sized dough balls. And then I covered them and let them rest for 10 minutes. Then I started to braid. When the braid was formed, I brushed it with vegetable oil. 2)  It also has more sugar than the recipe I made: mine only used 4 teaspoons of sugar for the whole recipe: this one uses more and the result should be a sweeter bread.
  13. This recipe will result in a whiter challah bread than others I have had. I suspect those recipes have more egg yolk added to the bread. It’s still delicious white.

Good luck making the bread. I am sure you will make nicer looking bread for sure.

What happens to your online life after you die?

In most jurisdictions, not much. The state of Delaware is attempting to deal with this legally. To see why,  look at this chart:

The law has an interest in determining how to deal with this online property, especially as it will sooner than later come up in legal disputes.

Here’s hoping more jurisdictions get on this as well.

Why Laurie Penny writes may also be good reasons for you to write

In the Overland literary journal, Laurie Penny has a long and interesting essay on why she writes. For anyone who is thinking of writing more and writing publicly, I highly recommend it.

Have reservations about writing? Her piece should persuade you to give them up and get down to the business of putting your thoughts and words out there for others to read.

Do it!

Thinking of painting one wall in your house a different colour? Before you do, consider this

Not for everyone of course, but this article shows you a novel way of turning a good idea – painting one wall of a room a different colour to make the room more interesting – and going one step further. The result is something like this:

If you are still interested, see Before & After: Maura’s $13 DIY Wall Art! | Apartment Therapy. Get the lamp, too.

If the new Mozilla Firefox OS smartphone seems familar, there is a good reason for that

Look at this picture. Amazing how similar these two phones are, yes?

The reason for this? The specs for the new smartphone are remarkably similar to those specs of the original iPhone. The phones even look similar, as you can see.

Two key differences between the original iPhone and the Firefox phone: release data and price. The Firefox phone is going to be priced well under $100, something an iPhone never has been (for good reasons).

Overall, I think the wider distribution of smart phone technology will only lead to greater overall benefits to the recipients. It will be interesting to see what change this causes. I think the net effect will be good.

For more information on this, click here.

Authentic rum is coming to the Fortress of Louisbourg in Cape Breton

Thanks to the folks at Authentic Seacoast and Parks Canada, it looks like rum and the rum trade will be coming to the historic site in Cape Breton, Nova Scotia. The news release says:

After almost 300 years, rum is once again being stored behind the massive stone walls of the Fortress of Louisbourg National Historic Site.

Authentic Seacoast Distilling Company Ltd., Parks Canada and Fortress Louisbourg Association are collaborating on a multi-year project to enhance the visitor experience at the Fortress through an authentic interpretation of the historical rum trade of 18th century New France. The Magazin du Roi will serve as a warehouse to mature carefully selected Caribbean aged rums for use in special edition Authentic Seacoast Distilling Company rums.

Sounds like a great idea. Rum and the rum trade is a not insignificant part of Nova Scotian history. It’s great to see this. For more on it, see: Authentic Seacoast™ Company Media Centre press release,  Rum Returns to Fortress of Louisbourg National Historic Site.

Changes and life improvements should not just be for the first of January

You can start life changes any time. These may be aimed on people making New Year resolutions, but you can resolve to change right after you read this.

Good luck.

En papillote: six simple seafood dishes (and a bonus dish, too)


Over at Kitchen Daily, they had a feature the use of en papillote (whether that is using parchment, foil, or some other material). Of the recipes there, these are the ones I look forward to trying soon, especially the first one.

  1. Sea Bass En Papillote with Tangerine and Grapefruit – The Culinary Chase.
  2. Simple Elegant Fish with Cauliflower Potato Mash – Savory Nothings
  3. Tilapia en Papillote |Billy Parisi.
  4. Soy and Ginger Shrimp Packets – The Culinary Chase.
  5. Sole in a Bag with Zucchini & Black Olives
  6. Recipe: Asian Salmon en Papillote for Two | Verily.

Bonus: this sweet potato recipe not only sounds good, but I love the source for it.

The Bacon Eating Jewish Vegetarian: Big Sweet Easy (Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Sumac).

The image is from the last recipe from Verily. If you are new to this way of cooking, go to that recipe: it outlines the simple technique using parchment.

Are you planning to move to a small space? You need this list

Over at A CUP OF JO is “15 Genius Tips for Living in Small Spaces” that really are worth a read if you live in or plan to move to a small apartment or condo or dorm. It’s advice taken from a couple that live in a 250 square foot place, and they practice what they advise. 250 square feet is very small, as you can see:

And yet it looks like a beautiful space. Take a look.

Phishing alert! Look for emails with the subject: Your iCloud Account Invalid Address #fb

This phishing attack is really good. Other than text like “we regret to announce” and a misspelling of “Apple”, most of the phrasing is well done and it all looks very official. Of course they sent it to my wrong email address, so that was another sign it was a phishing email. Most of the links are valid, too, except one that points to myioscare.uk. So yeah, beware. Here’s the text of the email:

Apple ID – <my email address at work>, (19 – September – 2014)

This notice is to therefore to inform you we regret to announce you that your Apple/iCloud Account (<my email address at work>) has been temporarily frozen until we can verify your iCloud Account details. This security measure to protect your Apple Account from unauthorized usage. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.
You will be unable to access Apple sync/backup or the iTunes/App Store & Apps Store until you update your Apple/iCloud Account details on file, we urge you to complete validation as soon as you can. Failure to update your account details within a 74 hours can result in deletion of your Apple/iCloud Account to protect our system.

How can I validate my Apple Account and restore my iCloud/Apple ID?
Just proceed to the highlighted link below to verify ownership of your Apple ID. Log-in in using your Appe/iCloud login and password, then read the instructions.

> Validate My Apple/iCloud Account

While using Apple products and apps, you’ll still sign in with your primary e-mail address as your Apple account.

If you have queries and want support, please visit the Apple Account Care site.

Regards,
Apple/iCloud Europe
Case Validation Request: #UJ13HA41317-EU11

How To Set Up Your Raspberry Pi For The First Time


If you just bought or are thinking of buying a Raspberry Pi, then two things:

  1. Congratulations!
  2. Read this: How To Set Up Your Raspberry Pi For The First Time – ReadWrite.

Not only will it help you get set up, but it also has a list of projects to get your started on doing something useful with it. As well, there’s some links to other resources.
There’s lots of material on Raspberry Pi’s on the Web, but if you haven’t found them yet, try this one at ReadWrite and get started.

Two good articles on the new economy (work is changing)

These two articles: In the Sharing Economy, Workers Find Both Freedom and Uncertainty and Is owning overrated? (both from the NYTimes) look at how people are changing their how they work and what they own in the new (American) economy. I don’t think there is one thing driving these changes. Partially it is how people feel about work, but also what type of work is available to them. Plus technology is allowing for people to work and own in ways not available before.

I found the first article depressing. My hope is that as more companies like this come along, they will need to compete more and this will be better for the workers. Indeed, this seems to be happening to Uber as Lyft (and likely others) come along. As for renting, I think there is a limit to this. While it makes sense to rent some things, I believe that subset is alot smaller than one may initially imagine. What may happen is that people own things for smaller windows.

What seems certain is that the days of working for one employer for along period of time is only going to decline further. Additionally people may conspicuously rent or hold for smaller periods of time and then release things.

Time and changes in the economy will tell.

 

Do you have Chromecast? Then you want 5by

Chromecast is great for putting YouTube videos on your big screen TV. The problem for me, though, is finding good videos to watch: I want to spend less time searching and more time relaxing. 5by.com answers that problem by providing you videos picked by them around themes. I have just started with it, but it looks good (in more ways than one).

For more information, see Video Concierge.

NYC has a good problem to have (some thoughts and observations)


New York City has a good problem to have: it’s getting increasingly more expensive to live there. In the second half of the 20th century, it had the opposite problem and the question was would anyone want to live in all but small parts of it. Those days are gone, so much so that Manhattan became too expensive for most, which partially led to people moving to Brooklyn. Now even Brooklyn is getting too expensive, according to this: Moving Out of Brooklyn Because of High Prices – NYTimes.com.

It’s not surprising to me: NYC is more desirable than ever to move to. Yet the parts of Manhattan and now Brooklyn that people find too pricey are not the whole city. I expect in a few years from now people will be talking about great spots in Queens and the Bronx and how they too are becoming more expensive.

Globally populations are leaving small towns and rural areas and moving to cities. Cities like New York will be the beneficiaries of this, and will grow accordingly.  Assuming they are well run cities, they will find ways to accomodate newcomers, and the parts that were cheaper will rise in value.

I don’t see NYC getting cheaper any time soon. It will be more what parts of it people live in, and what the housing will look like. I expect you will see more high rises built in places where none were before, and more and more neighborhoods being gentrified.

Here’s to a growing New York.

(Creative commons image from picsbyfreyja)

Interested in the MEAN stack? Check this out

Like alot of folks, I am interested in the MEAN stack, but in getting started, I haven’t found too many concise, all in one, pieces on the topic that are good intros. (I am sure there are some: I just haven’t found one.)

This IBM developerWorks article looks like it could be the one for me (and you): Mastering MEAN: Introducing the MEAN stack.

The title is confusing: you won’t be mastering MEAN with one article in devWorks, but you will have a chance to learn enough to get started.

Try it out and let me know what you think.

Why I am backing the ‘1984’ Stealth Fashion for the Under-Surveillance Society by Zoltan Csaki on Kickstarter

Here are my reasons for (and why you might want to as well):

  • To reduce abuse of access to your data: There are more and more stories of organizations, government and other, using and abusing data given off from your cell phone (e.g. this story on location based marketing in Toronto being just one).  This product can help put a stop to that.
  • To increase the amount of control I have: I may not have an issue with others using this data and there may be times when I think there is a benefit to me to have this data accessible. Generally I don’t, but I like the option. This product helps with that.
  • To encourage more people to make such products: if this campaign is successful, I hope to see more businesses attempting similar but different and possibly better products, which is a benefit to me and people like me who values their privacy.

Reasons against:

  • it’s not foolproof. By that, I mean anyone with enough motivation could still use the data you inevitably will give off when you are using your phone to extrapolate things about you. As well, there are other ways you can be tracked (E.g., abusive apps).

In my case, I think the reasons for outweigh the reasons against, and that is why I have pledged to this Kickstarter campaign . I would encourage you to pledge as well.

Here’s a link to it: ‘1984’ Stealth Fashion for the Under-Surveillance Society by Zoltan Csaki — Kickstarter.