We need to learn quickly to keep up with the massive change around us so we don't get run over. We need to outrun change.
radical changes taking place around us now
The Via Meadia reprint of their advice to college students from 3 years ago applies even better to those of us in the work force. The rules of the economy have changed radically and we better know what is going on around us or we will be in trouble. The post is Back to School.
Here are the major headings, my thoughts, and a few quotes
1. The real world does not work like school.
I really don’t know what to make of the Washington state regulatory rules for selling pot, which is illegal under federal law. I hesitate to mention it on this blog, but it is a useful exercise in stretching my understanding of the world around me.
William Barrett describes the new regs in his post, New pot rules for Seattle are a riot-for now, at New to Seattle.
Here’s just a few of the rules: Continue reading “Regulation for state-legal sales of federally-illegal product”
Census Bureau data shows about 28% of households ditched their landline and now rely exclusively on a cellphone. For households in the 15 to 29 age bracket, the portion doing so is about two-thirds.
That info is reported by the Wall Street Journal – More People Say Goodbye to Their Landlines.
Households with a landline dropped from near 100% in 1998 to 71% in 2011, according to a nice graph in the article. Households with a cellphone increased from 36% in ’98 to 89% in ’11.
That is a lot of change in just 13 years.
The rules for work have radically changed. The work world that existed when you started college, even if you graduated this spring, is gone. (Cross-post from my other blog, Attestation Update.)
If you are working, you need to take charge of your career and your reputation. This applies to brand new staff, experienced audit seniors, and especially partners. People at every level of employment need to absorb that lesson.
Jenna Goudreau summarizes 14 Rules of the New Marketplace That Millennials Need to Master at Business Insider. My only disagreement with her is that these rules apply to everyone at every level, not just millennials.
Do social media and cell phone technology lead to shallower, more fragile relationships or deeper, more intimate relationships?
Yes.
That seems to be the answer from Professor C. J. Pascoe in her article, Romancing the Phone.
I don’t talk romantic issues or dating stuff here, but her article helps understand what is going on around us.
She offers several stories of hurt that flows from use of technology. On that general trend: Continue reading “Technology making relationships more difficult?”
Daily I walk past a large group of honeysuckle plants that used to be about 30 feet long and about 12 feet wide. The aroma is wonderful while they are in bloom.
Over the last couple of months, something has happened to the plant bed. There are three big areas where there is now only dirt. The number of honeysuckle plants is about half what it used to be.
The ones left are pretty, growing, and fragrant.
However, that bed of plants is dying.
What is happening to those fragrant plants is happening to the book industry.
There are a lot of articles discussing the surveillance world we now live in. I would like to comment on many of them in a full post. Alas, time does not permit.
Here is my second list of good stuff that I’d like talk about but only have time to recommend with a quick comment.
Here’s two new phrases for you:
Continue reading “More good stuff on surveillance – 8-15-13”
I think the most serious damage from the feds spying on everything is that the effort could rapidly destroy our trust as citizens in our government. Collateral damage is that the big tech companies could wipe out our trust in them.
Bruce Schneier has been discussing this often, especially in a recent column at Schneier on Security – Restoring Trust in Government and the Internet
Look at these technically true comments that are actually very clever deceptions: Continue reading “Damage to trust in our government is most dangerous risk of the spying fiasco”
Amazing. The Boston Globe was sold for a negative sales price. The Washington Post is purchased by an individual for his personal portfolio.
Cancer rates are going down. Increasing life expectancy is reducing the growth in population.
Lots of surprising things going on around us that we often don’t focus on. Check out this video of Ron Bailey discussing some of the items with Reason TV:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbHHXTa5eUw&feature=player_embedded]
What are a few of those things you probably hadn’t heard lately?
Continue reading “7 ways life is getting better – you likely haven’t heard about them”
How’s this for disruption – a 42% drop in the volume of point-and-shoot cameras shipped in the first five months of 2013.
Olympus expects their volume of low-end cameras to drop 50% this year compared to last.
Continue reading “The next industry to collapse – low-end digital cameras”
How about truck driving as a threatened field?
The Wall Street Journal article provides a question you may hear soon: Daddy, What Was a Truck Driver?
Truck driving
Continue reading “More industries transformed by tech revolution – truck driving, legal field”
There is a revolution going on in education. Many writers are talking about the education bubble at the primary, secondary, and collegiate level. My preferred metaphor is an open frontier. You can see my posts here.
An article in Chronicle of Higher Education, The Gates Effect, gives good background on the role of the Gates Foundation in advocating education reform.
The long article attacks the Gates Foundation strongly and repeatedly. It is the latest is a series of critical articles. Seems to me most of the current article is focused on giving voice to those pushing back against the changes taking place in the education world.
What I hear as the primary theme of the above article is that only those inside the education establishment should speak to reform.
As to the substance of the criticism, that is the topic for widespread discussion for several years.
Gates Foundation is one of the movers behind the education revolution
Continue reading “The establishment pushes back against the education revolution”
Barry Ritholtz summarizes the currently known scope of information being gathered by the U.S. government in his post, How Much Is the US Government Spying on Americans.
There is an extensive list of the ways and means of data gathering in the long article. There are multiple dozens of links to other articles if you want more background on any specific point he makes.
Here’s a good summary: Continue reading “The reach of federal data gathering is beyond imagination (most people call that spying)”
Update – Third attempt on 7-15-13 unsuccessful. Frequent failures are the price of innovation. Two successful landings is very cool.
Here’s an amazing first: a self-flying drone, the X-47B, took off from land at Patuxent NAS, flew to the U.S.S. George H. W. Bush and landed itself. It was then launched off the catapult and landed again.
Check out the video in the WSJ article: Navy Drone Successfully Lands on Aircraft Carrier.
There wasn’t an operator on the ground controlling the drone – it flew itself. Very cool.
Continue reading “Autonomous drone lands itself on aircraft carrier”
