Living in the Future

Tag: Ideas

  • A New Podcast

    A New Podcast

    It’s a special week here, celebrating a new series, Mind Grapes!

    The first video will be coming out tomorrow (September 15), and it’s all about my adventure seeing the total solar eclipse this summer.

    In the meantime, I’ve published a short podcast episode (it’s literally 3 minutes) talking about my plans and goals for the website and YouTube channel, which you can find at its permanent home: unwindmedia.com/seedsofthought.

    Come back tomorrow to find out some of the interesting science of a solar eclipse.

  • Post a proper linked Instagram photo to Twitter, like a Gentleman

    Post a proper linked Instagram photo to Twitter, like a Gentleman

    When you used to post Instagram photos to Twitter, it would automatically expand the photo in Twitter, to show your beautiful shot in all its glory. However, when Twitter launched its own photo sharing natively, it started blocking the auto-expanding of photos from Instagram, so pictures looked ugly as heck when shared from Instagram to Twitter. Here’s what I mean:

    Sharing images the regular way (like I did above) leaves this text-based tweet, leaving users to guess what the picture is of, because neither Instagram nor Twitter wants to cede ground on letting users of both platforms see pictures from the others’ social network.

    However, I’ve come up with a fix, and it involves a great service called IFTTT. If you’re not using it already, do yourself a favour and go sign up. Once you’ve done that, all you have to do is go to this link, and you’ll be able to post directly from Instagram to Twitter, with a full resolution version of the photo, while still maintaining a link back to Instagram in case people want to go check out your other photos. That looks like this:

    As you can see, that’s way better, but you still get the link back to Instagram.

    PS. If you’re using this recipe from IFTTT, you shouldn’t select the native Twitter sharing when posting in Instagram, or you’ll end up with a double post, one with the image, and one without. And nobody wants that.

    Post a proper linked Instagram photo to Twitter, like a gentleman. by robattrell – IFTTT

  • Communication is Broken

    Communication is Broken

    Communication is unbelievably important for a properly functioning society. And after ranting a little on Twitter this morning, now seems like as good a time as any to break down the best communication tools, why they’re good, and what they’re good for.

    Today’s communication is broken, we can’t talk effectively with the people we’re closest to, and the very services that aim to bring us closer together are keeping us further apart than they need to. We can do better!

    Let’s keep it really simple to start: 1-on-1 communication. It’s really hard to get this wrong, because it’s fundamentally the easiest thing to do. Effectively, communication between two people can be public, or private. There’s a continuum of more vs. less private, but almost every platform has options for private individual communication. Believe it or not, some people ONLY use these kinds of communication. Here are a few examples (they’re all really old school):

    • Phone Call (voice; tied to a phone number)
    • Email (text, with attachments; tied to an email address)
    • SMS (text, maybe photos; tied to a phone number)

    Like I mentioned, some platforms advertise themselves as much more than private 1 on 1 communication, but they do still have that aspect available. These aren’t as limited, but can function in such a narrow way:

    • Snapchat (ephemeral photos/video and text; tied to an account on one phone at a time)
    • Skype (text, media attachments and video/audio calls; tied to an account with possibility of phone number)
    • iMessage (Text, photo/video, audio message; tied to an Apple ID, but can add phone numbers or email addresses)

    Now, the services covered so far have mostly been private (Snapchat now has *public* Stories), but there are also communication methods that let you communicate with one person, but in public.

    • Facebook Wall Post (text, photos/video; tied to Facebook accounts)
    • Twitter Mention (text, photos/video; tied to Twitter accounts)
    • Google Hangout on Air (audio/video; tied to Google accounts)

    These companies all have their respective private messaging platforms as well (Facebook Messenger, Twitter Direct Messages, and Google Hangouts), which are useful for both individual and group messaging, but they all have their limits, and are easy to use inefficiently.

    Now, instead of getting to the best services that offer the most diverse communication right away, let’s go through an exercise first.

    I’m going to attempt to make a list of all of the communication platforms I make use of in the average week. This is a combination of mobile/desktop, 1-way or 2-way communication, personal/business…this is as exhaustive as I can be on the matter (in no particular order, I’m just going through my phone and computer):

    Google Calendar
    Phone
    FaceTime
    Google Drive
    Nuzzel
    Flipboard
    SoundCloud
    Periscope
    Podcasts
    Reddit
    Google+
    Facebook
    Trello
    IFTTT
    Google Photos
    Facebook Messenger
    Snapchat
    Twitter
    Google Keep
    LinkedIn
    Hangouts
    Email
    Kijiji
    Blogging
    Television
    YouTube
    Slack
    Instagram
    SMS
    iMessage
    Peach
    RSS
    Blogs
    News Sites
    Customer Service Live Chat
    Talking in Person

    I’m sure, even given this exhausting list, that I’ve missed a couple of really obvious communication methods. That being said, they all have various reasons why I use them. I use some more than others, and for a variety of reasons some get used very little (sorry, Peach).

    Having said all of that, The best communication methods I have at my disposal are easy to understand, but have diverse uses. I’m sure I could get by with any of these methods of communication on their own, but it would be difficult. Each has its limitations, and strengths.

    In a perfect world, we would all agree to have accounts for all of these services, and all use whichever one we feel like at a given time. However, for me, the following is (in my mind), a perfect set of tools to satisfy all communications needs. Order in this list is VERY important, and changes/improvements to any of these services could change the order.

    1. Slack
    If I have you on my Slack team, and I know you actually have the app on your phone/computer or visit the website from time to time, this is by far the way I’m going to contact you. The way Slack integrates with the rest of the items on this list makes its prime spot a no-brainer.

    2. Twitter
    I love Twitter (and would only be able to love it more if they got rid of the 140 character limit, though there are plenty of reasons why that’s challenging). Twitter integrates well with Slack, and lets me follow cool people to keep up with the world better than any service I know how to. It’s also a semi-public conversation, and so you can kind of see what everybody is up to.


    3. Hangouts
    Having Hangouts on this list is a no-brainer, simply because of the video chat capability. Hangouts also integrates well with Slack, although I don’t use that feature much, but Slack’s link control is so good that it’s plenty for my needs.

    4. Email
    You always need a fall-back. Sometimes, you’re talking with a stranger, or a distant acquaintance. Sometimes, you just want to be notified of something that pertains to just you. In many cases, email is a good way for people you don’t have on Slack or Hangouts to get in touch with you privately (although Twitter is really fine for that too).

    I’ve extolled the virtues of Slack before, and maybe it’s a failing on my part that so few of the people I’m closest to really get its appeal (since the people I do use it with really seem to get a lot out of it, and I use it extensively even just for my own personal non-communication needs).

    I love Facebook Messenger, but really only because many people have Facebook accounts. If the people I talk to most on Messenger were on my Slack team and actually used the service, I wouldn’t use Messenger nearly as much. And having said that, though Messenger has taken great strides to make messaging fun, fast, and beautiful, it’s INCREDIBLY difficult to keep track of multiple threads, and for groups of close friends who talk about lots of different things, it’s a nightmare. Seriously, use a Slack team for your group of close friends.

    I’m going to keep advocating for Slack and Twitter, because they have been essential to my modern life and I love communicating with them so much. I’m interested to see how communication changes as the online world creeps more and more into our every interaction, and what the next generation of communication services look like.

  • How To Get Noticed Online

    How To Get Noticed Online

    For those of you wondering, this is how I see myself.

    I’ve conducted experiments before, but the one I’m going to embark on for the next week will potentially be the most difficult I’ve ever challenged myself with. If you followed me online in December 2014, you’ll recall the Instagram Experiment I embarked upon in the last episode of +Attrell Update (at least the last so far). Basically, I wanted to try Instagram, because I had had an account for several years but had never used it. The experiment was what I would consider a success because I still post photos and video there, and I enjoy the tools Instagram provides to edit and share photos to Twitter and Facebook.

    So, onto this new experiment I will be undertaking starting with the next 7 days. I am somebody who consumes a LOT of media. Podcasts, video, music, television, movies, books, blogs, long-reads, op-ed’s, reviews, etc. There is a lot of stuff on the internet and I take in quite a bit of it.

    For the most part, this media is a one-way street. I slurp it up like a vacuum but rarely contribute to the conversation about it unless it is VERY compelling or I think I can make a particularly witty joke or comment. For the next week, I am going to do my very best to leave some kind of comment, observation or thought on every single thing I read. EVERY. Single. thing.

    I have a feeling this will help me get to know people on the Internet, help me better understand subject matter and actually contribute to the Internet as one of its citizens, and it might help me reach people with my thoughts and ideas that otherwise might not get to them, and vice versa.

    Some simple rules I will try to follow:

    1. I don’t HAVE to leave a comment if the content is offensive or overly negative. I will use my own discretion here.
    2. This will mainly apply to blogs, videos, podcast episodes, things with a home on the internet where you can leave a comment or discuss the media.
    3. I will do my very best to use the original source to comment on the material. For instance, if I read a story on a web page, I will leave a comment on the page directly, or on Twitter (like if I found the link there or on other social media).
    I don’t know that this will be easy, but I’m sure I will find it rewarding. I encourage you to try a less comprehensive version of this, I know that about 99% of people on the Internet soar around 10 feet above what they see, never talking about it or sharing it or liking it no matter how much they enjoyed the content.
    Wish me luck!
  • My Student Debt

    My Student Debt

    Mo’ money…mo’ problems, said no one, ever.

    Another quick thought:

    I have been out of school for 3 years (completed all requirements in Dec. 2011). I wasn’t particularly careful with money during my 5 years of schooling, but I wasn’t wasteful either, and I also worked for most of that time. I amassed just over $63,000 in student debt over those 5 years.

    I’ve been in the work force for 3 years, and in that time I have spent a total of around 8 months unemployed, 2 of those voluntarily. Since January 2013, I have spent only about 9 weeks not working (of the 5 positions I’ve held, only 1 was a longer term than 6 months). I have recently passed the $20,000 mark in paying off this debt; as of this month, I only owe around $17,000 in loans.

    I like to consider myself a success story in terms of reasonably independent adults with a university education who lived away from home during their studies. I know people who are in much better financial positions than me, but I know many more who are far worse off. And I would only tangentially credit my post-secondary education for the jobs I’ve been able to get, I haven’t been paid for any chemistry-related work since I left grad school.

    The fact that so far, I am what I think people would consider a success story makes me pretty sad for our society as a whole, and our education system specifically. I would LOVE to work in Chemistry, but that takes years of experience that I cannot get outside of university, and getting that experience by staying in or returning to school would be unavoidably expensive.

    I’m fairly confident that if I apply myself, I can expect a base level of success at whatever I choose to do with my life. This inherently takes some risk, something I’m not particularly comfortable with, and something that gets exponentially more complicated the longer life goes on. I don’t want to just float through life on a base level of success in what is handed to me, I would like to do something I am passionate about and achieve real tangible, life-fulfilling levels of success, something that is very hard to do knowing I will spend 4-5 years just getting out of debt from school.

    I would love to keep learning my whole life, and I intend to, whether that education is formal or not. I want some freedom to pursue independent creative endeavours and to explore philosophical ideas without worrying about losing what I’ve been working so hard for. I just hope that money cash doesn’t rule everything around me for my entire life. I am still looking forward to starting a family soon.

  • On Memory

    On Memory

    It’s been a while since I did a good old fashioned blog post.

    I’ve been doing a lot of hard-core thinking about big ideas the last couple of years, trying to figure out the best way to explore my thoughts on things that are really important to me but are hard to talk about in everyday conversation without people not wanting to hang out with you any more.

    The brain is a beautiful thing. Don’t waste it!

    However, today’s topic should only be tangentially related to this, and has more to do with the way my memory seems to have changed over the last few years, basically since I had what I consider full adulthood.

    I have always been told I have a pretty good memory, and I do have the somewhat uncanny ability to recall random facts from way deep down in my consciousness. It’s a fun party trick, until I overdo it and come off as pedantic or weird. Fact can only be so certain, and everything is subject to logical and never-ending scrutiny.

    It’s also worth considering that memory is a muscle, and things we don’t think about or which don’t fit into the world-view or thoughts we have tend to be forgotten or dismissed pretty quickly.

    For instance, I have heard that the healthiest way to drink bottled water is to purchase a bottle, empty the water inside (because that water has been slowly getting contaminated by the plastic in the bottle), refill the bottle with purified tap water from the nearest sink, and drink the new water. I heard that from a reputable source, but there are so many factors that go into determining the validity of a fact like that, there’s no quick and easy way to prove to somebody that it’s true. We also don’t know much about contaminants in plastic and what quantities would prove dangerous, with effects that might take 10-20 years to build up enough to notice adverse health effects or cancers.

    What was I talking about again? Oh yeah, memory.

    So, memory has been fickle with me of late. I’ve been told I have a really hard time remembering things, and maybe that’s true. But more often these days, I find that what really happens to me is that my memory of something actually stores multiple similar but distinct copies of something. I’m not sure precisely why that is, but I find it very interesting. To give you an example, say I am trying to make dinner plans with a group of friends, or even just one other person to keep it simpler. I might ask “What time would you like to do dinner? 5:30, or 6 PM?”. The person responds telling me that 6 works better for them, but then 20 minutes later, they tell me that upon consideration, 5:30 would actually be more suitable.

    What happens to me and my memory in this scenario? I create a memory to store the dinner plans I’m making, and I open a mental slot in my schedule for the evening in question. When they answer 6 PM, I store that in the dinner plans memory, kind of like a sticky note, and promptly stop thinking about it. Later, when I get the news of different plans for 5:30, I have to go back, find that original memory, and what ends up happening is that I put a new mental sticky note on the original plan.

    When I revisit the original memory to remind myself what time we’re having dinner, I find the memory with two sticky notes attached. I vividly remember making dinner plans, I can recall asking about times, but for the life of me, I cannot think about the 5:30 memory and the 6:00 memory and recall which is the more recent, and therefore accurate, memory.

    I don’t think this means that I have a bad memory, and maybe it’s more to do with the WAY I store memories and think about things than anything else, but this does cause real confusion in my life, and it leads people to believe that I’m forgetful, or not paying attention, when in fact having TOO much memory tends to be the cause of my problems.

    For a long time in the history of life on Earth, there hasn’t been much reason to remember things in order temporally, unless there is a strong emotion associated with a stimulus. When humans were in real danger from animals on a regular basis, knowing that sounds of shifting grass in a field meant that a lion was about to pounce might save your life. However, in our society today, we don’t get a lot of stimulus like that, and so there isn’t a lot of opportunity to tie survival to memory.

    Most of what humans “learn” when it comes to memory these days comes from repetition, It doesn’t help much with things like remembering if dinner was at 5:30 or 6 PM, or whether you wanted to eat our at a restaurant or stay in, but it can certainly come in handy when you’re talking about exercise, eating healthy, or taking out the garbage. We’re creatures of habit, and slow and steady wins the race.