Poisoned places

Npr.org search poisoned places

Particles from exhaust get 10x toxicity when combined with heat and other chemicals on the environment. We don't test for that today. 

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"I have no special talents. I am only passionately curious" - Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

GoogleTalk - Gamification

GoogleTalk !! 

Gabe Zicherman - Gamification Revolution (Book) 

chatter

Wow why so much time motivating gamification. Most guys are sold on it. Anyways this isnt solid data. 

- Try googling "managing millenials" 

- Kids like Instgramming and messaging so much that they would rather not drive. (Research by an automobile company). WTF !! Really !! - These tools have kids on frequent Dopamine hits !! 

- You cant stop the millenials from this path of gaming that they are on. You HAVE TO JOIN THEM !! ( :( really - I always thought the rule was the latest trends are the most recently outdates ones. Maybe the  next generation will move the needle maybe a bit towards the genX) 

I don't think you need to say - Millenials are gamers and so engage them with a Gamification strategy. I actually believe anyone is better engaged with gamification. 

I am getting bored after 25 mins. Too many examples. Ok ok I understood it works. I am more interested in how to implement this (on myself or in a small group setting) 

concepts: 

- Dopamine Hit - Challenge - Achievement - Dopamine - Pleasure  - Games let us loop through this cycle again and again. 

- Fluid Intelligence - Figure our way out. V/s Regurgitating learnt information

- Techno-physio Evolution - Both Genotype and PhenoType evolutions affected by tehcnology. Example: Lifespan increases. 

- Society valuing interaction with machines more than interactions with other humans. Autistic individuals have a strength here. 

- "One ring to rule them all"

questions 

1. How to keep people engaged using gamification techniques. 

  NYT wrote about - in 2 years relationships change from romantic to companionship - Habituation. Habituation enemy of long term engagement. One technique is make rewards unpredictable.

2. Any problems where you wouldnt use gamification ?  Whats the mechanics of gamification ? 

 - No clean specification of mechanics. Use gamification to do gamification. Visit gamification.co 

 - Everything is defined-by/based-on engagement. So gamify everything !! 

3. Make simulations only as interesting as the real world.

4. What are some stumbling blocks in Enterprise gamification ? 

- Most places roll out things by fiat. - thats a big NO

5. Can gamification be used to reduce engagement in cases like addictions ? 

yes. Alcohol Anon. Gamification drives mastery (of control)

 

Covered California

Big Insurance providers opt to wait and watch. Providers signing up leave out high cost health case provider networks to make plans affordable. 

$300 average premium in california and 40% will be eligible for subsidy and only 16% of California expected to sign up for this. 

[link] No more exclusions based on prior conditions, the mandate to buy insurance even if you're healthy and subsidies to make insurance affordable for lower-income people.  Covered California Executive Director Peter Lee is planning a $236 million marketing campaign -- paid for by the federal government -- to recruit healthy, uninsured people to the exchange. Lee hopes to enroll 1.4 million Californians in 2014 and millions more in succeeding years.

[kqed] When setting an individual's premium, insurance plans in the exchange may look at only three factors: age, where you live and family size. Insurance companies may no longer use your health condition or your health history to set premiums. People may no longer be turned down for pre-existing conditions.

[kqed] fears abound that young people's premiums will skyrocket because the health law limits the difference in price between plans for the young and old.

Steve Jobs - Walter Issacson

Listening to this audio book. Why did Issacson choose this guy to write about. There is zero inspiration to be derived from his life and accomplishments. Smart guy who is rude and throws childlike tantrums - thats all that I got from the book. No subtle lessons to learn from his life - No taste of the impact  of any of his accomplishments - the life of bouazizi would've been so much more interesting. What a bloody waste !! 

Revolution 2.0

Revolution 2.0 

Wael Ghonim's book on the egyptian struggle is inspiring, insightful and fast. He has a good story to tell - his personal and that of his country's. Although there are sections where it seems as if he is not telling the whole truth. But what was interesting to me was that the demands that the protesters in Tahrir square were all problems that India is blighted by as well. Corruption, Poverty, unemployment. Maybe the level of police atrocities was too much in Egypt and the level of unemployment was  higher too. But the way I saw it - if these hadnt been at the levels that they were in Egypt the youth wouldn't have had the balls to come out in protest. Indian youth has no incentive to participate in something like this. Especially after what we see is the long term result of a leader-less revolution that has no constructive plan on the other side of the revolution. Living in a society does mean having strong institutions - if the existing institutions are all rotten it makes sense to tear them down. But then until new ones replace these you have no roof over your head. And then you have people ready to fall back into their old groves making the emergence of newer institutions even more difficult. I dont know if we have examples of societies that have been able to get rid of such major rot in the systems. Would be nice if someone funded studies and experiments on these things instead of investing in enabling farmville. 

 

Gangs of Wasseypur

what  super shitty movie "gangs of wasseypur". Maybe life is like this - but its hard to believe so Much shit happens with such speed. Its as if he took life filtered out any semblance of joy from it and then played the remaining at 5x the speed. No shades of gray in any character. Its all f*ing black. Its so tempting to take a break from the cloyingly sweet SRK and flying chiffons - but this is a bit too bitter a view.