Saturday, August 12, 2017

Thought(s) 4 the Week (W-End Edition): On #Peace








Our team settled on this compilation of thoughts courtesy of Jonathan Huie & his team especially in light of all our World has been witness to in Qatar, North Korea, Yemen, SyriaAfghanistan, etc. etc. etc--to aim to create a "Vision of the Possible"!!!  

 We can, shall and will overcome!!  




When you find peace within yourself,
you become the kind of person who can live at peace with others.
- Peace Pilgrim

It's not the situation that's causing your stress,
it's your thoughts,
and you can change that right here and now.
You can choose to be peaceful right here and now.
[Inner] Peace is a choice,
and it has nothing to do with what other people do or think.
- Gerald Jampolsky

If in our daily life we can smile,
if we can be peaceful and happy,
not only we, but everyone will profit from it.
This is the most basic kind of peace work.
- Thich Nhat Hanh













Tuesday, August 8, 2017

Notations From The Grid (Special Weekly Edition): On Our World

We here at the Daily Outsider respect the work done by the team at Ozy Media.   We were particularly impressed as they featured a story on Iran--Somalia is also just as fun to read about--and they have 25 Million Reasons to be proud of their accomplishment.   It is all about creating a different vision to as they say, stay interesting.


Please enjoy:


THE DAILY DOSE

#1 FAST FORWARD

Your Next Big Vacation: Somaliland?

The beaches are amazing, but it technically doesn’t exist. 
#2 TRUE STORY

My Night in an ICU — in Cuba

Spoiler alert: She lived to write this story. 
#3 FAST FORWARD

A Free Couch to Crash On in Iran

A sign of the times in the Middle East: The tourists are coming.
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MORE MUST READS

#4 GOOD SH*T

I Dined in One of North Korea's Restaurants

What’s on the menu in North Korea? As it turns out, not politics.
#5 FAST FORWARD

Soldiers? Diplomats? Nah — Send In the Tourists

Tourism is a powerful force. Maybe it’s time to put it to work for world peace.
#6 GOOD SH*T

Karachi's Picture-Postcard Beach

On the far outskirts of Karachi sits a small and impoverished hamlet with a beach so beautiful it belongs on the cover of a luxury travel magazine.
#7 GOOD SH*T

Syrian Eats on Istanbul Streets

Restaurants are creating a culinary home-away-from-home for displaced Syrians.
#8 FAST FORWARD

KFC in a War Zone

KFC left Syria, but some other companies are finding that doing business in a conflict zone can pay off. 

Sunday, August 6, 2017

View of the Week (Special W-End Edition): On Smart Watches/Etc



For this special weekend edition of "View of the Week", our team chose this from Fortune that reflects upon the evolution of Smart Devices--as a member of our team took a recent quiz on career development courtesy of AT&T that he was good enough to share with us.  It is an implicit mission of our "Visions" Property here.

What was written courtesy of the team at Fortune is about the art of the possible as we should all take note of: 
The Download on Technology

The Download on TechnologyThe Download on Technology

AUGUST 4, 2017
Hi, Aaron in for Adam for the last time this week. The essay will be back in Mr. Lashinsky’s capable hands on Monday.

Do you wear a wearable? By that I mean anything from the cute, plastic Fitbit Flex wristband you picked up a few years ago for $50 to a ceramic-cased Apple Watch Series 2 you got for Christmas that cost the giver $1,300. Maybe you’re a real watch fiend and you’ve gone even more upscale, say, for the almost $9,000 titanium Exospace B55 Connected from Breitling? No, not your style?

While I bet a solid proportion of Data Sheet readers do have a smart device strapped on, in the wider world, the wearable movement seems to have reached a plateau—or maybe even a dead end. The market trackers at Strategy Analytics say 21.1 million smartwatches shipped last year, barely more than 2015’s total of 20.8 million. Wednesday, we heard about slipping sales from Fitbit and Garmin. And we learned yesterday that, so far this year,the market has resembled a barbell. Growing sales of cheap bands from Xiaomi in Asia and higher-end watches from Apple offset massively lower tracker sales from Fitbit, Garmin, and others stuck in the middle. Net-net, the market grew a mediocre 8%.
The key question for the future, of course, is one of utility. How truly useful is a smartwatch or tracker? And does it retain that usefulness after the novelty wears off?
I used to wear a standard watch every day and for the past few years I’ve been wearing an Apple Watch (though also with experimental periods of various Fitbits and a Samsung Gear). I appreciate some of the little bits of info I receive with just a flick of the wrist, as well as the tracking and prompts for my exercising. And the app called Round—it reminds me which medication to take when—is, almost literally, a lifesaver. And, yes, I like the way it looks with my daily choice of strap options. But I know not everyone wants more interruptions, and the battery life remains pathetic.
Apple and its competitors are hard at work on making better, thinner, more capable watches and so maybe the market does keep growing. But as I was reading last week about the Wisconsin company that was seeking employee volunteers for an embedded smart chip, I thought maybe the future won’t be on the wrist. Some combination of smart chips, contact lenses or glasses, projections of augmented reality, and smart devices scattered around the home could make smartwatches—and maybe even smartphones—seem like quaint relics. But I’ll still miss my rainbow striped nylon watch band.
Aaron Pressman
@ampressman
aaron.pressman@fortune.com

 
 
 
AUGUST 5, 2017
Here we go again. The FBI arrested a prominent hacker in Las Vegas this week, and the Internet is in an uproar. There’s talk of malicious prosecution and fear the arrest will chill security research.
Well maybe. But first we should figure out what happened.
If you missed it, the hacker in question is a young Brit named Marcus Hutchins. He became famous this year after stopping a wave of ransomware, known as WannaCry, that was spreading across the globe. His action helped halt attacks that froze millions of computers, including those at schools and hospitals.
Hutchins is considered a hero for that. But here’s the thing: In 2014 and 2015, prior to his WannaCry heroics, the FBI says Hutchins created and sold a notorious piece of malware, known as Kronos, designed to steal people’s banking information. If the accusations are true, Hutchins engaged in some serious criminal behavior.
Nonetheless, many on Twitter and in the media see the arrest as a case of injustice. Some have pounced on a legal analysis of the indictment to say the charges are unfair or overreaching. Others allege this wouldn’t have happened if he was back in Britain. And so on.
All of this has a familiar ring to it, and stems in part from past injustice against hackers: Who can forget the Justice Department’s cruel prosecution of Aaron Swartz, which drove the young genius to suicide in 2013? Critics also rightfully worry about the feds’ use of vague and outdated hacking laws.
Unfortunately, the tech and hacker community is also quick to cry injustice every time a popular Internet figure is arrested—even if they’ve done very bad things. Examples include ongoing sympathy for Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht (aka the Dread Pirate Roberts) and Kim Dotcom, a gangster-like figure who engaged in massive copyright theft and is attempting to use a cult-of-personality to avoid extradition.
In the case of Marcus Hutchins, it’s too soon to pass judgment. We don’t know all the facts yet. But just because he stopped WannaCry doesn’t give him a free pass to commit bank fraud (if that’s what he did) any more than a heroic deed will excuse a gunman from robbing a convenience store.
The hacker community needs to take a breath. Some prosecutions may be unjustified but that doesn’t mean hackers should never go to jail.
Jeff John Roberts
@jeffjohnroberts
  

Friday, August 4, 2017

Thought 4 the Week (Special Weekly Edition)

We picked this courtesy of Vala Afshar on Twitter which goes to the heart of creating a "Vision of the Possible" for all:


All our dreams can come true, if we have the courage to pursue them.
—Walt



Tuesday, August 1, 2017

As August Dawns.....

Welcome to August here in the Daily Outsider as we achieve a milestone here in our "Visions Channel, our 800th Piece!!

As we begin, we wanted to share this snapshot of the Future: 



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The value of cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and ether is skyrocketing, but illiquid, fragmented markets and costly exchanges can make investing in crypto seem unappealing. However, a new platform is poised to simplify the process while also lowering costs for investors and helping stabilize the entire crypto market.READ MORE
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The Drake Equation is a method of quantifying the likelihood of finding intelligent alien life. Many variables influence the equation, which continually expands, but there are limits as well. READ MORE
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A US Congressman asked NASA whether Mars hosted an alien civilization at some point. Despite potentially favorable conditions on the red planet, it is almost infinitely unlikely that the planet ever hosted sophisticated life in the way suggested. READ MORE
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Google Brain and data science platform Kaggle have announced an "AI Fight Club" to train machine learning systems on how to combat malicious AI. As computer systems become smarter, cyberattacks also become tougher to defend against, and this contest could help illuminate unforeseen vulnerabilities. READ MORE
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Google's iconic Glass is now back, but this time the wearable is not meant for the average consumer. Alphabet's X division has refocused the device for optimal use in the workplace, and already, the reboot is poised to be more successful than the original.READ MORE
See Full Infographic
This Beating 3D Printed Heart Could Save Lives

Complaints  |  Indiana U.
Managers often clueless about unhappy customers

Old-school  |  Vanderbilt
Class teaches Navy to navigate by the stars again

GPS pushed the US Navy to stop teaching celestial navigation. A free online course is changing that.

Injections  |  U. Warwick
Knee shot means less morphine after surgery

What's next?  |  U. Michigan
‘Back to normal’ isn’t easy for young cancer survivors

Recycled waste  |  Rice
Using biochar on farms may cut health costs

Middle school  |  U. Washington
Cannabis risk awaits young teens with depression

Iron  |  U. Melbourne
‘Rust’ could be the real Alzheimer’s trigger

Some people with lots of amyloid in the brain don't have dementia. This has spurred an investigation into iron as a potential driver of Alzheimer's disease.

We also wanted to share the following we featured in our "Home" property and our "education" property as we go "dark" for the Month: 


preview image

July was also  President Trump yet again being President Trump.    This is also as Iran and the United States seem to be on a collision course in the aftermath of Iran's latest launch of a Missile that ostensibly  was for a a Satellite.  Iran also seems to be headed for some further conformation  with various factions as President Rouhani finalizes his cabinet.    Our team reviewed reporting reflecting the fact that Candidates for Foreign Minister, Defense Minister and Intelligence had to be vetted by the Office of the Supreme Leader before being presented to Parliament.    It is also of note that Iran's Justice Minister is also indirectly appointed by the Supreme Leader as he's due to be appointed from an approved list by the head of the Judiciary--A Supreme Leader Appointee.   It will be quite a month.

As we go dark in these pages for the Month of August, our Twitter Feed will be active with our daily updates courtesy of Nuzzel and Paper_li along with our Broadcast POD which will feature live feeds from Al Jazeera and Sky News.     Despite all the challenges at hand, we remain hopeful about our World as underscored by this recent snapshot our team received recently from the team at TED.COM

Onward to August with all its' possibilities .




TED
THIS WEEK ON TED.COM
JULY 29, 2017

Grace Kim: How cohousing can make us happier (and live longer)


10:15 minutes · Filmed Apr 2017 · Posted Jul 2017 · TED2017
Loneliness doesn't always stem from being alone. For architect Grace Kim, loneliness is a function of how socially connected we feel to the people around us -- and it's often the result of the homes we live in. She shares an age-old antidote to isolation: cohousing, a way of living where people choose to share space with their neighbors, get to know them, and look after them. Rethink your home and how you live in it with this eye-opening talk.

PLAYLIST OF THE WEEK

#Goals

Counterintuitive advice that will help you set and achieve your goals for the short term, the long term and those moments in between. Watch »
5 TED Talks • Total run time 51:44

THIS WEEK'S NEW TED TALKS


Jimmy Lin is developing technologies to catch cancer earlier. He shares a breakthrough technique that looks for small signals of cancer's presence via a simple blood test, detecting the recurrence of some forms of the disease 100 days earlier than traditional methods. And with cancer, early detection can make all the difference. Watch »

A handful of people working at a handful of tech companies steer the thoughts of billions of people every day, says Tristan Harris. And they're all competing for one thing: your attention. Harris shows how tech companies prey on our psychology for their own profit, and calls for a design renaissance in which our phones and apps encourage us to live the lives we want. Watch »

Do your kidneys have a sense of smell? Turns out, the same scent detectors found in your nose are also found in some pretty unexpected places -- like your muscles, your kidneys and even your lungs. In this quick talk filled with weird facts, physiologist Jennifer Pluznick explains why they're there and what they do. Watch »

Corals in the Pacific Ocean have been dying at an alarming rate. But it's not too late to save them, says TED Fellow Kristen Marhaver in this hopeful talk about why we should keep fighting to save our oceans. "Corals have always been playing the long game," she says, "and now so are we." Watch »

READ MORE ON IDEAS.TED.COM

Brain: Want to understand alien intelligence? Start with the octopus »
What is consciousness, and does an octopus have it too?

Food: Inside a vertical ocean farm »
A clever plan that grows oysters, scallops, seaweed and more

Culture: Did you watch The Bachelorette this season? We did and here's why »
A thoughtful talk with Aunt Vernā Myers on race, love and television


QUOTE OF THE WEEK

From our homes, we look down into the courtyard, and depending on the time of year, we see this: kids and grownups in various combinations playing and hanging out with each other. There's a lot of giggling and chatter. There's a lot of hula-hooping. And every now and then, "Hey, quit hitting me!" or a cry from one of the kids. These are the sounds of our daily lives, and the sounds of social connectedness."
Grace Kim
How cohousing can make us happier (and live longer)

SINCERELY, X: PEPPER SPRAY



Listen to TED and Audible's new podcast, Sincerely, X. This episode, titled "Pepper Spray," follows a woman whose visit to the store triggers a panic attack, giving listeners an inside look into those suffering from PTSD and how to help. Available now on Apple Podcasts, the TED Android app, or wherever you get your podcasts.