Mostly, I Write – Telegram
Mostly, I Write
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Storie e pensieri suoi e di altri, raccolti da Antonio Dini http://www.antoniodini.com
Per contatti su Telegram: @antoniodini
Per iscriversi alla newsletter Mostly Weekly: https://tinyletter.com/MostlyIWrite
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Attenzione, gli americani stanno per arrendersi. Già non riciclano, poi le cose per chi vuole farlo non sono per niente facili e insomma, basta, qui sta per finire anche questa spinta. E se loro non vogliono più fare la loro parte...

Money quote: "Yes, trash has become complicated, with products that used to come in cans now in combinations of cardboard and plastic. And then there’s the brain-draining complexity of yogurt tubs – one of the items, along with dirty take-out containers, that The New York Times said Americans are recycling incorrectly. I put on my reading glasses and studied a carton of Greek yogurt. I discovered all sorts of mysterious symbols, which may have something to do with the lack of GMOs or gluten.

There were explicit instructions not to put this product in your freezer, which I might have guessed to be the case, but not much help with the container disposal. A tiny, barely perceptible resin code was stamped on the bottom. It was a 5, I think, which means it’s polypropylene, and is accepted as recyclable in some communities and not others."

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-06-27/plastic-recycling-is-a-problem-consumers-can-t-solve
Il NYTimes continua a fare meraviglie con il suo approccio all'informazione online (ma servirà poi a qualcosa?) In ogni modo, la storia del corrispondente del Times che torna in Venezuela per vedere come vanno le cose dopo esserne stato sbattuto fuori anni fa. E come vanno le cose? Beh, insomma: medio? Direi forse peggio...

Money quote: "A New York Times correspondent returns to Venezuela"

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/06/27/world/americas/venezuela-money-how-to-survive.html
Da un lato capisco tutto, l'attrazione impropria da parte di uno studente, la mancanza di esperienza, il rischio che tutti corrono. Però il modo di risolvere non mi piace lo stesso.

Money quote: "His opening line was, “The thing is, I find you incredibly attractive. And I don’t know what else to do. Is there even a chance?”
Ethan was appealing, but no. Zero chance. We talked about whether he would stay in my class. He said his fondness wouldn’t become a discipline issue. And he turned out to be a great student. Still, I made a report to my boss. Just in case. Imagine if he failed my class. Filed a grade appeal. Told Student Affairs that I hit on him, or encouraged him. What a stain."

https://medium.com/@JessicaLexicus/can-you-swipe-right-on-your-professor-cc205d9159e7
Data visualization: storia della immigrazione negli Usa. Sarebbe bella una mappa così anche per l’Italia di recente
Lo sappiamo tutti che viviamo in un universo in scatola, no? È un po' come quelle prove dell'esistenza di Dio, che non provano nulla ma da un punto di vista logico ammazzano una generazione: se possiamo immaginarlo, allora non possiamo escludere che sia successo. Figuriamoci se possiamo farlo anche noi...

Money quote: "At the other end of the philosophical spectrum, I met with Don Page, a physicist and evangelical Christian at the University of Alberta in Canada, noted for his early collaboration with Stephen Hawking on the nature of black holes. To Page, the salient point is that God created the Universe ex nihilo – from absolutely nothing. The kind of cosmogenesis envisioned by Linde, in contrast, would require physicists to cook up their cosmos in a highly technical laboratory, using a far more powerful cousin of the Large Hadron Collider near Geneva. It would also require a seed particle called a ‘monopole’ (which is hypothesised to exist by some models of physics, but has yet to be found)."

https://aeon.co/ideas/the-idea-of-creating-a-new-universe-in-the-lab-is-no-joke
Alla fine, la creatività non ha bisogno di particolari oggetti, dice questo buon uomo, che uccide in un colpo solo milioni di acquirenti di Leica, Moleskine, iPad, MacBook, etc.

Money quote: "Do you know what my favorite tool is for drawing cartoons? It’s not the Series 7 Kolinsky Sable brush. Nor is it the Hunt 107 pen nib.

Heck, I have a diverse collection of fountain pens, brushes, nibs and quality inks. I also have an iPad Pro with the Procreate app, which makes it super easy to draw and color digital cartoons.

But every time, the tool that brings me the most pleasure is the lowly ballpoint pen. I’m not even particular about the brand, but lean toward a Bic, in black ink."

https://artplusmarketing.com/the-stunning-power-of-simplicity-for-your-creative-growth-2bd331ac3b09
Lei è furba, al di là di tutto, ma i temi che solleva sono interessanti. Questa idea che una donna possa emanciparsi emotivamente tramite la professione del sesso a pagamento rispetto al sesso romantico di coppia è astuta ma anche molto molto criticabile.

Money quote: “I have an every-Tuesday man who brings me gifts in the strip club where I still dance topless. Never jewelry or Gucci bags — things most strippers want so we can flip them for cash to pay rent and bills — but paintings with heavy frames and, on a different week, a large Ziploc full of matches”

https://medium.com/s/story/im-a-celibate-sex-worker-230f70425e12
Lettura per la domenica. La storia (poco nota) degli ebrei sfuggiti alle persecuzioni naziste (e all’Olocausto) rifugiandosi a Shanghai. Apre squarci sulle dinamiche assurde dell'epoca nazista.

Money quote: “In fact, until 1941 when the routes immigrants used to get to Shanghai were closed off by the war and the Germans decreed that Jews could no longer emigrate from the Reich, Jews in occupied Europe were not only allowed to leave, but were pressured to do so through a system of intimidation and force. Although they didn’t make it easy, the Nazi party, eager to implement their plan to rid Europe of its Jewish population—to make it judenrein or “cleansed” of Jews—did allow Jews to leave under certain conditions.”

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/shanghais-jewish-quarter-hongkou
Il punto centrale di questo articolo secondo me è parlare ai cinquantenni. A un ventenne non gliene frega niente. Invece, le cinque cose da fare per vivere di più attirano sempre le persone di mezza età, piene di rimpianti. Detto questo, e notata anche l’estrema banalità delle cinque cose in gioco, è fantastico il modo totalmente quantitativo con cui anche questa volta vengono declinate.

Da leggere nel contesto della considerazione che Linus con Radio Deejay sul tema della salute per chi invecchia ci ha costruito una carriera sopra, prendendo il pubblico di ragazzetti degli anni Ottanta e lentamente portandolo verso l’andropausa a suon di mezze maratone, diete low carb e concerti di Jovanotti. Stesso schema, differenti strumenti e forme retoriche.

Money quote: “They say there's no fountain of youth. But a comprehensive new Harvard University study is the latest report to break down exactly how much extra time you can get yourself on this planet if you follow a small number of positive life habits.

None of these habits will be a surprise, but the stunning part is how the Harvard researchers claim to be able to quantify exactly how much more time you'll likely live: specifically an extra 12.1 years for men, or an extra 14 years for the women.”

https://www.inc.com/bill-murphy-jr/these-5-habits-literally-add-years-to-your-life-according-to-a-new-harvard-study.html
Mueller ci sta mettendo troppo tempo a portare avanti la sua indagine? C’è già in questa suspance un intento persecutorio nei confronti di Trump? Andando a guardare i precedenti, non sembra proprio.
Ovviamente abbiamo sbagliato tutto nella vita. Perché, quando arriva il momento dei bilanci, sono le nostre inazioni, non le azioni, quelle che ci fanno stare male. È la differenza tra rimpianto è rimorso. È una gigantesca falla psicologica, un loop che ci divora tipo buco nero. Provare (a guardarsi dentro) per credere.

Money quote: “ According to psychologist Tom Gilovich, lead author on “The Ideal Road Not Taken,” published in the journal Emotion, our regrets that bother us the most involve failing to live up to our “ideal selves.” Basically, we’re not as bothered by the mistakes we’ve made or the things we ought to have done as we are bothered by never becoming the person we truly wanted to be. “

Poi, siccome ogni cosa deve essere materialmente fattibile nel mondo del neo pragmatismo e dell’auto aiuto, ecco la solita ricetta per vivere meglio etc etc.

https://lifehacker.com/how-to-avoid-a-life-of-regret-1826928609
Le scuole di scrittura creativa, quando sanno fare il loro mestiere, sono fantastiche. Anche perché si appoggiano sulla meccanicità della scrittura e sulla capacità degli esseri umani di ricostruire il senso, un qualunque senso, a posteriori.

Questo esercizio per creare descrizioni e metafore efficaci è semplicemente delizioso. Magari non vi cambia la vita, ma vi rende più consapevoli della tecnica, al di là dell’ispirazione.

Money quote: “You know what it is. It’s those denoscriptions that you read in other’s writing that make your jaw drop. The eloquently put and beautiful, but unorthodox, metaphors that almost shouldn’t work but do. It’s what makes the writer unique, giving you something you’ve never read before.“

https://medium.com/@carlymaedee/a-life-changing-exercise-to-make-you-a-better-writer-bf8b04932c8b
Secondo me la cultura di Facebook non è del tutto normale

Money quote: "Let us consider a concrete example. When we are getting close to launching products at Facebook we often move the product team out of our usual open floor plan and into a room so they can coordinate in even tighter loops. As a rapidly growing company, it can sometimes be hard to find the space for these so-called war rooms. Before the launch of our games platform we needed to move more people into a war room than could possibly fit in any floor plan. Not to be defeated, the team came in over the weekend and built a loft which could support desks on two levels. This is classic hacking. The team solved a problem on a dimension, quite literally, that was unexpected: when you think of a floor plan you think of width and depth, not height"

http://boz.com/articles/the-hacker-way.html
Flirtare con un libro, anzi con la vostra foto mentre tenete un libro. Perché no? Se siete di origine anglosassone, lo facevano i vostri trisnonni...

Money quote: "The cards were “flirtations”: coded explanations for how to flirt with the opposite sex, using an item as your prop. In this case, the item was a book. Book leaning against your left cheek? Careful, someone’s watching us. Book on your knee? Let’s talk. Book between your teeth? It’s over."

https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/book-flirtation-cards-victorian
Forwarded from Scrivere zen
🤝 Non so per te, ma per me spesso le riunioni sono un incubo. Quello che ho imparato è che di solito basta la metà del tempo per dire le cose per cui ci si è tenuti liberi una giornata intera https://thecooperreview.com/10-tricks-appear-smart-meetings/
Avete presente i grafi? Forse conoscete la parola, ma il suo significato, cioè cosa sono e come funzionano? Impariamo i grafi

Money quote: "A graph (as in "graph theory") is a discrete mathematical structure which deals with objects and pairwise relations between them. Graphs have immense applications in various disciplines of science. Knowledge of this subject is essential for mathematics and computer science enthusiasts.

D3 Graph Theory is project aimed at anyone who wants to learn graph theory. It provides quick and interactive introduction to the subject. The visuals used in the project makes it an effective learning tool."

https://mrpandey.github.io/d3graphTheory/index.html