I liked the article but would agree that it may have benefited from being more explicit in its writing. Here's what I got out of it. Maly asks, "Why would you continue to wear a hoodie even though you're hot and would feel better not wearing it?" The answer that @kevinalexbrown implies and I'd agree with is that fashion is an advertisement about yourself. But that's not all.
When the advertisement is more important than the person, even if you would feel better without the hoodie, you keep it on, to feed your image. Whether that's right or wrong in the general case is beyond my scope to say. Maly is using Zuckerberg's choice as a prism on facebook and modern tech in general, saying that those who adopt facebook will have to make similar decisions, that people who always believe they are being watched may elevate the need to project an image over other more human needs.
The key to the article is that Maly believes Zuckerbergmay have kept his hoodie on because it was more uncomfortable to take it off than to experience physical discomfort, and that people who are being watched may do the same. I enjoyed the vignettes but Maly could've benefited from highlighting Zuckerberg's choice as the "strange thing" that his article grew out of and then using the history of the hoodie as a layer on top of the "strange thing" instead of juxtaposing the two threads.
That reminds me of a short science fiction story, (I think by Isaac Asimov?) but I can't for the life of me remember what the title was. The protagonist was a writer, who began begrudge the time he would wait for his bus and time waiting for red lights and time waiting in general. By virtue of some machine, he was able to get everything in his life in sync, so that he never had to wait for other people or other things anymore. By the end however, he was unable to write anymore because he found that those times of randomness were when he was able to find his inspiration.
The following is a vignette from a series of vignettes on improv by Billy Merritt:
[THUMP, THUMP, CRASH]
The closet door explodes outward and inside the closet there is a 6 foot worm standing upright. It is green with bits of moist hair all over the body. The head of the worm has two giant eyes that always seems to be crying, and pinchers for a mouth. It makes a noise that is a cross between a hiss and a donkey bray.
Creature: What the fuck is that?!?!
MASTER: That is my worm.
Creature: Your what?
MASTER: My worm. We all have them.
Creature: I'm pretty sure I don't have a worm. I think I would know if I had something like that.
MASTER: Yours may not be as big, but you definitely have one, I can tell.
Crerature: How can you tell I have something like that? Is it inside me? Will it kill me? Jesus, get it out of me!
MASTER: EASY. Once you become an improviser, once you feel you have it down enough that you can improvise with anyone at any time. A worm develops inside you.
Creature: You mean once I finally get it, I get this, this worm inside me. I don't want that, it's disgusting.
[the worm weeps a little louder]
MASTER: The worm is all your bad habits. All the rules you break in order to make a scene work. It feeds off of your bad habits it lives off of denials and bad object work.
Creature: Well then don't you want to kill the worm. Your worm is so big.
MASTER: Thank you. You can't kill the worm, just like you can't eliminate all bad habits. Sometimes you have to break the rules in order to further the scene and go where you never thought you could. You must except your worm, you have a symbiotic relationship with it.
Creature: How do you know when you have a worm?
MASTER: You will know. It will speak to you. You will find yourself doing a scene and you will realize that what you are doing is wrong, then a little voice will say "do it, see what happens" , that is the worm.
Creature: Should I always listen to my worm?
MASTER: No, if you feed it too much it will consume you. You need to develop a relationship with your worm, know your worm, know when to let your worm out to play, and also know when to keep your worm inside.
Creature: Why is your worm so big?
MASTER: I'm a level 37 improviser, a shaft of light, My worm has grown along with me. But I still have to control it, make sure it doesn't get out of hand, or out of the closet.
Creature: What happens if you lose your worm, or if it dies.
MASTER: Then you become a improrobot, making automatic responses, and doing automatic scenes. You run a risk of losing your creativity, your life force. You lose the truth.
I'd think that the non-invasive restriction is most likely related to the FDA's distinction between significant risk devices and non significant risk devices. In addition to traditional study approvals(Independent Review Board etc.), significant risk devices require FDA approval to begin testing for effectiveness (IDE applications) and are fraught with risk.
I don't remember offhand if finger-stick blood glucose testing devices are termed significant risk devices or if they are given exemptions. If these devices are given exemptions, then this would likely be a good precedent to follow to execute lab on a chip type devices.
I agree that the lab on a chip analysis represents the most exciting part of the implementation, but I also think that it would be interesting to see what types of associations we can get with usual metrics such as pulse, blood pressure, etc. when the data is more easily obtained.
Really cool article, I learned a bunch. It's cool that she talks about the role that imitation plays in a creator's growth. A different sphere but reminds me of this rap from the song Dr. Carter.
Good afternoon Dr. Carter
I don't know about this one
His confidence is down, vocab and metaphors needs work
And he lack respect for the game
[LW] Uhhhh let me see
[FN] You think you can save him?
[Lil Wayne]
Okay respect is in the heart so that's where I'mma start
And a lot of heart patients don't make it. But, hey, kid
Plural, I graduated
Cause you can get through anything if Magic made it
And that was called recycling Re: reciting something
Cause you just like it so you say it just like it
Some say it's biting but I say it's enlightening
I believe he is saying that traditional metrics of mastery such as the "10,000 hours" of work metric are incomplete because they are extrinsically defined metrics. Venkatesh makes the point that except for a few well defined fields such as mathematics or violin (fields with predictable boundedness), such extrinsically defined metrics do not provide much useful information.
Therefore, using the analogy of relativity, Rao proposes a new metric of mastery based on intrinsic metrics. Metrics that he believes may provide insight as to whether you are truly improving if your work spans that of multiple fields. These metrics function as axes for your journey through "endeavor space". These axes are rework, referencing, and releasing. If you are wondering whether you working with grit or wasting your time, a self evaluation via these axes can help to tell you whether you are working towards mastery or not.
That's the gist of it, with one correction. The 10,000 hours bit is fine, the missing detail is how you count to 10,000 when there are no convenient external reference points. The true extrinsic variables are things like a named discipline or degrees as indicators of experience.
You're right about the financial expected value, but I think you might be disregarding the trust aspect of the transaction, which I think was why Airbnb was so successful. Buying into the brand reinforces a particularly optimistic world view that people who are likely to use Airbnb enjoy.
Plus, when you are giving your key to another person, the risk is not just monetary, but the additional emotional risk of just being violated. I think it was very telling that EJ was particularly betrayed by the lies in the ongoing email updates and not just the monetary loss.
Exactly. People (including myself who used the service) felt that it was more legit than Craigslist when in fact, they have the same financial protection.
I think its a good problem solving tactic to try to look for analogous situations and gain insight into our current dilemma in doing so.
I think a better analogy might be a sit in. If you occupy all the seats in a restaurant, I think it kind of qualifies as a meatspace DOS. I guess the difference is that in civil rights sit ins of the 60s, the people sitting in actually wanted service.
I guess the digital analogue would be a bunch of people requesting permission to donate to Wikileaks, rather than permission to load the page. It seems the subtle difference is that civil rights groups actually wanted the service that they deny to others, while anon wants a service different from the one they are denying to others.
I guess its up to individuals whether they think the difference is significant.
The control protocols are not well documented at all, starting in 1996, all cars are required to have OBD ports.
The manufacturers don't want people to know the control protocols for various reasons (security, manufacturers make money selling repair materials and codes to repair shops, licensing codes to third parties etc.)
But it is possible to discover the control protocols, a friend and I worked on it for his Toyota Yaris I think by monitoring all the outputs from the OBD and changing a status (locking a door) and watching what bits change. We got a lot of equipment and help from a professor at school. We used a GPS and ended up making a little app that monitored where the car went, its speed, and various car statuses on google maps. There's a lot of info out on the Toyota Prius if you feel like getting started.
While I can agree that jumping through hoops to meet regulations sucks, the cost of failure and the potential for unintended consequences justifies the high market entry costs. To be fair, the FDA is constantly making decisions (with regards to approval) that ethicists have struggled with for millenia. Furthermore, its not readily apparent what constitutes an effective drug in many cases due to the placebo effect.
For an example of the FDA's good work, if you have the chance, take a look at the FDA's 483 for the McNeil plant that recently got shut down (the children's Tylenol, Benadryl, etc. recall). Its kind of horrifying: http://www.fda.gov/downloads/AboutFDA/CentersOffices/ORA/ORA...
Perhaps a more relevant example would be the case of United States v. Caputo (7th Cir. 2008). Caputo had gotten clearance to sell a small sterilizer of surgical equipment without tubes or hinges. His customers, being satisfied with that equipment, requested a larger sterilizer instrument that could sterilize equipment with tubes or hinges. Caputo, meaning well, and believing that the changes between the two equipments were trivial (as it would seem at first glance) produced what his customers requested and sold and marketed it. Turns out that one of the opthalmic instruments being sterilized had brass joints that reacted to the peracetic acid being used to sterilize. It resulted in numerous people being blinded. Of course, he later failed to report the cases of blindness to the FDA, which resulted in further problems. But I still believe that the point can be made that the possibility for unintended consequences and the high costs of mistakes justifies the high barrier to entry that the FDA imposes.
In the case of the snake antivenin, its a long process to produce antivenin in general. Its made by injecting a sheep or horse (older antivenins used horses, newer ones tend to use sheep) with the venom and then gathering and purifying the antivenin that the sheep or horse produces in response (Animal rights groups have historically protested in locations where antivenin is made). Hopefully the government or some public interest organization will fund further production of the antivenin, its unfortunate that antivenin is not more durable.
