Team Collaboration

As per class assignment, we've collaboratively created a web page.

Here's the project: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/l8ghh3jlx1v14ev/8zc9YU7qaR?dl=1

Here's a preview

The Next Season

The speech season is officially over, with the NU Team in a comfortable bid for first or second in the state of Michigan and even a good national presence. So I'm getting started on my work for next year, I want to do 8 events, almost triple what I did this year. Here they are

Info

• Google Glasses
  • History of AR
  • Positives
  • Negatives

ADS

• Excessive Pessimism
  • Problems
    1. Elitism and false nostalgia
       • http://cnsnews.com/news/article/santorum-state-our-culture-under-administration-continues-decline (everyone thinks their solution is the right one)
    2. Discourages the search for solutions
       • http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167487010001388
  • Causes
    1. Media
       • Pessimism sells http://www.rationaloptimist.com/
    2. Cultural postmodernism I don't like this point; suggestions would be welcome
       • http://www.phil.ethz.ch/fileadmin/phil/files/13Pessimism.pdf
  • Solutions
    1. Society
    2. Individual

Persuasive

• ???

Rhet Crit

• ???

Prose

• You Don't Know Me
  • Author David Klass
  • Summary
    • John's stepfather is cruelly abusive, and he lives in silence because he wants his mother to be happy.
  • Selection
    • What do you think I look like? Skinny? Freckles? Wire-rimmed glasses over brown eyes? No, I don't think so. Better look again. Deeper. It's like a kaleidoscopic. One minute I'm short, the next minute tall, one minute I'm geeky, the next studly, my shape constantly changes, and the only thing that stays constant is my brown eyes, watching you. That's right, I'm watching you right now, sitting on the couch next to the man who is not my father, pretending to read a book that is not a book, waiting for him to pet you like a dog or stroke you like a cat. Let's be real, the man who's not my father isn't a very nice man. Not just because he is not my father, but because he hits me when you're not around, and says if I tell you about it, he'll really take care of me. Those are his words. "I'll really take care of you John. Don't rat on me or you'll regret it." Nice guy.
    • I walk half way around the house, and see no signs of life. My house that is not a house is quiet, dark and, to all appearances, empty.  I reach my backyard, pass the apple tree that is actually a gray-leaf tree, and stomp through ankle-deep snow to my back porch. I quietly climb the steps, open the door, and slip inside. But as I reach to turn on the light, a hand shoots out of the darkness and grabs my arm in a painful grip. "Gotcha!" a voice says, and I smell the whiskey reek of the man who is not my father.

Poetry

• Quantum Lyrics
  • Author A. Van Jordan
  • Selection
    • Tonight, somewhere lost in the occipital lobe / filled with geometry and seduction, I consider / Newton's laws of motion, force as matter accelerating / at the speed of sound and tearing through a room / like a man bent on destruction

Extemporaneous Speech
Impromptu Speech

One News

The entire internet is about Apple today. Sorry.

After Dinner Speech

When trying to come up with a topic for my ADS I ran into some problems. To be honest, I ran into _one_ problem: my roommate- whom we'll call Leslie, because he deserves it. Between the constant sounds of his X-Box and the faint haze of Cheetos dust that seemed to build up around him, I couldn't think. Now, don't get me wrong, Leslie,dear Lord,heart of Gold, love the man like a brother, and he really did try his best to be helpful. I had already decided to talk about college because, well, I'm a middle class white male from the suburbs. I'm pretty boring. And fat. Anyway, Leslie, he suggested things like "Tell them about the time I let the Delta Phi guys defecate in my closet for initiation," not only doesn't he get the concept of a speech, he doesn't really get the concept of an initiation... he wasn't actually rushing the frat at the time. But, as his suggestions grew more and more inane, it dawned on me. I dramatically stood, and, while dramatically pointing,  I dramatically said "You are too dumb to be in college!"

Now, that may be a controversial opinion, but it bears thinking about. The Millennial Generation is the first to go into the world with the idea that a college education should be as universal as a high school diploma, and that sounds really good! It isn't. There are real issues arising from over-education, and not just for the individual currently enrolled. The trend is hurting our economy and if it continues, will make a recovery all the more difficult.

So, today, we'll enroll ourselves in the causes of over-education, sleep through the effects, and finally, overdose on caffeine while studying for the solutions.

Like the number of times I've actually been to my Management class, there are two primary causes of over-education. The first is a the idea that college equals higher earnings, the second is the employers waiting to gobble up college grads as soon as they've dry cleaned their caps and gowns. Everyone who's ever spoken to a High School counselor has heard that college graduates earn a billion times more than those that just get a High School diploma- there's no data on if that includes people who major in Window Licking or Philosophy. However, what if you flip the cliche on its head; what if college isn't a magic jillionaire-creation factory, but the people who would likely be jillionaires in their own right are the type of people who would be in college. According to Christopher Jencks's report "Inequality: A Reassessment of the Effects of Family and Schooling in America," that may well be the case. He finds that students from high earning families tend to earn more than their less fortunate counterparts, _even when they receive the same amount of schooling_. In fact, the report finds that higher education only increases the earning potential of poorer graduates by a fraction of that of wealthier students of comparable attainment. The system is more obviously damaged than Penn State day care alumni, but encouraging people to go to college is the solution to a problem that doesn't exist. In fact, by encouraging more spending towards a system that isn't helping their earning potential, the poor are more adversely effected than anyone else.

And that's just half of the fun! Because I'm gonna let you in on a secret. Businesses love hiring educated people, but businesses hate paying for shit! You see, hiring people is hard, usually. They want money, they want "sick leave" and "not to be sexual harassed at my McDonald's job when I was 16" -long story, and probably explains the Penn State joke- so that a good employee is expensive. Usually. But, when employment is down, good employees go on clearance. According to U.S. Census Data,  educational attainment dipped in the late 70s and early 80s; not surprisingly, these numbers coincide with high unemployment rates; as high as 10 per cent. What is interesting, though is that afterward, when employment rose back to it's original level, educational attainment rose up to seven percent above the former levels, with no rise in employment or average income. During the recession, people saw that those with degrees had jobs, and they wanted jobs. So they got degrees. Suddenly, employers could take their pick because everyone's got a degree. Which meant that employers could look at your resume and say "you can have the job, for half the salary, none of these benefits, sign over your first-born son, and no you don't get a company car." It's the law of supply and demand, with demand very much in the lead. So we've seen that over education has its roots in the erroneous idea that college equals higher earnings and businesses that want to get grads on the cheap.

Now that I've got you terminally depressed with the causes, I'm just going to hammer home the despair with the effects of the situation, which are- if you can believe it- worse. Like the number of sober students in my Thursday night Economics class, there are two of these. The first is that you can't get a job, but that's okay because the second is that your University didn't prepare you for one anyway. You see, the glut of well educated folks has led to this thing called "mal-employment." The term refers to the phenomena where people aren't employed in the fields they got expensive degrees for. According to the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University, as many as 40 per cent of college grads are mal-employed, six years after graduation. Degrees aren't just an excuse to learn things, or to smoke copious amounts of pot and waste four years of your parent's money. Degrees are an investment. This is especially a problem when you consider that according to President Barack Obama on January 27th, while speaking at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, student loan debt now exceeds total credit card debt in America.

So a market full of graduates screws the grads coming and going, is there anyone not getting screwed? Oh, right, the universities, with all of the extra enrollment, they've got to be doing okay, right? Not really. Because, you see, when everyone wants a degree it becomes a factory process, like high school. This is where places like ITT Tech, the University of Phoenix and other for-profit universities flourish. These places give up degrees like Charlie Sheen gives up reality. In fact, ITT Tech, in 2005, paid the State of California for just such an offense, to the tune of $750,000.00 according to Doug Lederman of InsideHigherEd in October of 2005.

So, now that we see how terrible the situation is- worse than Whitney Houston's February horoscope (too soon? I don't care; I was using that joke in January)- we can finally turn to some solutions. There are two, the first lies in education and discussion, and the second in the cold machinations of big business. The first order of business is that there needs to be frank dialogue about whether college is a good idea, not only in the community at large, but in the counseling offices, in the classrooms and over dinner tables. According to the October fifth, 2010 Huffington Post, Americans still view community colleges and vocational training as inherently less successful than a four year degree. The next step is to hold businesses accountable for their hiring practices. Enforce transparency about hiring practices, and reward companies that hire based on merit rather than education. Above all, emphasize that businesses that hire smarter, not easier, will pay less for a better employee.

Today, we looked at the problem of over-education, its causes, the effects on students, universities and businesses, and some possible solutions. It's hard to discuss the problem without coming across as a classist or an elitist, but this isn't a problem of rich versus poor or smart versus dumb. It's a problem with our culture and our economy that punishes those that shouldn't be in college with crippling debt, and punishes those that should be with degrees that don't return on the investment they represent. To return to our first scenario, it turns out my friend Leslie dropped out recently. But he took a job with a Fortune 50 company  and is making more every year than his total education would have cost. Leslie is better off for not going to school, who else could be?

The Consolations of Philosophy

There is a reason I try to stay busy and caffeinated, mostly because if I don't, I have an irrepressible knack for getting myself down. If you couple this with an overall disappointing night, and worrisome outlook, it can be quite a funk. Tonight the culprit- aside from things that actually happened, which are inconsequential and not worth dwelling on- was Jean-Paul Sartre and his works. A French philosopher, he was a noted opponent of determinism (I think). This is itself isn't bad, because determinism is one of the most depressing outlooks a rational being can assume. No, the problem is not limited to M. Sartre's particular philosophy, but is, I think, intrinsic to all philosophy.

Take, for example, determinism. Broadly speaking, it's the idea that your choices, either by fate or chemistry, are predetermined, and that no conscious effort can even be attempted to alter the choices you will make. At first the good and bad (comforting and not comforting) aspects seem obvious. On the one hand, you can't be blamed for anything you do. On the other, you have no free will. But then you try to comfort yourself in the first point again, only to realize that no one else can be blamed for anything that they do, and anyone that's ever harmed you isn't a viable target for vitriol.

I could go on and on down this rabbit hole, but you see my point. For every comfort philosophy offers, it presents two wounds. This is true of all branches of philosophy; you'll never find one that leads to a comforting or "happy" place. Religions are somewhat better, but always promise happiness after unhappiness. Philosophies, religions, and any other attempts to answer "The Big Questions", seem to only show us that no matter what, we are unhappy in the here and now.

This might also be because happy people have better things to do than ponder philosophy and start religions.

Practicing in Chicago

Today I'm using a writing prompt from The Write Practice, in which the topic is Chicago; again, comments and critiques are welcome, as are your own efforts. Here's the prompt:

PRACTICE Write about Chicago. Write for fifteen minutes. When you’re finished, post your practice in the comments section. And if you post, make sure to give some other Practitioners some feedback.

Two and a half hours out of Michigan, I was feeling a little sane again. I don't know why I came, I just had to get the fuck out. Out of the state, out of my hometown, out of my mind. I knew I was in Chicagoland when traffic started to slow, and the city proper sort of crept up on me. I parked in a lot that seemed well lit, and well traveled, and locked the car. I stepped out into the weather and looked around. I left in the early afternoon hoping to get to Chicago in time for a sunset, but it was hidden behind a slate of clouds, the flat no-color gray of radio static. The wind buffeted me like an errant passerby and I smiled. In my mind, this is how I always pictured Chicago, cold and stark and just a little bit dangerous. Geographically, it was the closest of the Great Old Cities, a moniker I used in my head for New York, Boston, San Francisco, and Seattle. I guess Detroit is old as well, and Grand Rapids is prettier, but there was something not quite the same about those. Sinatra said it best, "Chicago is my kind of razzmatazz and it has all that jazz."

I'd been working for six years straight, coming out of college, and I had an apartment and a mountain of debt to show for it. Dammit, I deserved some razzmatazz, some magic. I hadn't planned a trip, really. It was Saturday, I was going to have my late breakfast, read my e-mail and go to the gym. I was reading an e-mail from my direct supervisor, telling me in no uncertain terms that my work was unsatisfactory, my job resting on how I handled our newest client, and I felt a twinge of pain low in my abdomen. I wasn't good at my job, and they should have fired me a while ago. But they knew as well as I how badly I needed the money. So I suffered without complaint and they suffered me.

I shut my laptop and grabbed my keys. Left my phone on the table, left my breakfast on my plate. I got into the car I'd owned outright since high school and made south, then east. A voice that sounded unlike mine, yet still intimate, still familiar, was urgently whispering that Chicago would be something, and anything at all was better than reading the rest of my e-mail then going to work out with people I didn't particularly care for.

Now, I was walking in the city, and I felt better. There was no one here that knew me, no one here that considered me a poster child for bland, desperate mediocrity. Chicago is one of those cities that really is a melting pot, every human desire and regret and triumph and failure blending and fading into each other in ways that were somehow alchemical, and the result was a whole entirely different than the sum of its parts. I walked in silent rapture, savoring my anonymity and the feeling of surrender. Somehow in this, I was more alive than ever before. I think it might have been me; it wasn't anything special about Chicago, it was a joy to just be anywhere different. The stone gray sidewalks and black/brown-gray buildings under that cold, steel gray sky were more real than the plastic technicolor I'd left behind.

I walked to the cheapest motel I could, asking directions from other nameless, faceless people, as interchangeable as I was. I payed with a credit card and used the room's phone to call up a buddy. He had a truck. I told him to go to my apartment, and pack up everything, I'd pay him five hundred dollars plus gas to bring out here. I had enough saved to live for a while, but I made a note to see about some jobs in the city after renting some storage space in the morning.

Incredibly Inspirational

An incredibly inspirational lecture by Peter Diamandis at the TED conference. His optimism about technology and the world in general is refreshing when so many are so grim. It's important to remember the sky has been falling for the past 12,000 years, and each generation sure it was the last with any sense, or able to avoid disaster.

Regarding Windows

So, today, this article turned up in my RSS feed Windows 8 Consumer Preview: No Going Back from Gizmodo , and that's what we'll be discussing today.

I've read some reviews of Windows 8 and have seen some usage and the first thing that struck me was "dayum, that is pretty." Because it really really is. I mean, just look:

That's gorgeous! This is Microsoft finally paying attention to their products looking finished and cohesive across all brands. Note that you can find this same design principle- the Metro UI- across all of Microsoft's properties: Windows Phone 7, XBOX, Zune, and now Windows 8. It's minimalistic, sleek, and symmetrical. This is a departure from the recent movement by industry design leaders (read: Apple) to embrace skeumorphism (an example of a skeumorphism is a calendar application that looks exactly like a calendar on your wall; real life allegories in a digital environment) as a design principle. It'll be interesting to see which comes out on top, but for my money I prefer non-skeumorphic.

It looks nice, and by all accounts- I have not used it, so this is not a hands on review- it's quite snappy and responsive. There is an active community quickly developing apps for the system, and they're mostly free. So that's all good.

However, there are some issues. This is a touch based operating system. It was definitely designed touch first. From what I've seen and heard, using it on a desktop is almost entirely like using Windows 7, which is pleasant- it's the best Windows to date- but that means this upgrade might not be necessary for most. It also means that where the touch environment is most notable- the Start screen (pictured above) and Windows 8 apps- it may be difficult to navigate via keyboard and mouse. Lifehacker tested this with a keyboard and mouse, and while it seemed that they figured it out and it worked well, the point is that it isn't intuitive, out of the box, you would likely spend some time figuring this stuff out. What I'd really like to see is hardware that catches up to this software. A multitouch trackpad if they could get it passed Apple's lawyers, and perhaps a capacitive touch screen if they can't. That would actually be pretty interesting, it could display notifications, and integrate or perhaps be replaced by your Windows Phone.

I like what I've seen so far, and if it's at least as good as Windows 7 and Windows Phone 7, then I'm sure it will do well.

My Productivity System

Since is the first post of its type, I feel no shame in conducting some original research. I don't have a formal job right now- all my current freelance work is strictly short term- so I don't have a very set work schedule. So my productivity notes will be strictly Writing, Speech, and Schoolwork based

• Writing- With my writing, a big portion of "productivity" is sticking to a schedule. Even though I don't write professionally, I still like to keep up the quality of my work. So I have time blocked off every day to write; for this I use Google Calendar. In my personal calendar, I have my most creative time- between one and three, jacked up on caffeine- blocked off for serious writing every day. That means prose, letters, speeches, or essays. To keep my writing backed up, I use Dropbox. This is also handy because if I ever need to get reviews or feedback, I can get an easily share-able link. Highly recommend. To make sure that I'm actually on track, I use the Pomodoro Technique: which is essentially sprint working.You intensely for a short period of time, and then take a break. Very effective. To implement this, I use a Chrome extension: Strict Pomodoro. It blocks distracting sites while I work, and times me. To actually write, I use Focus Writer, a freeware tool from a great developer.
• Speech- Speech sometimes gets enveloped in writing, as I do indeed have to write speeches. However, there is a more fine grain approach to it. Starting with speech ideas, I use Evernote to keep track of any idea I have, tagged with which type of speech it is, and what season I'm hoping to use it for. Once the ideas are compiled, I forget them. Then, when I need a speech, there they are. After that, I use Google for research, and compile the research in Evernote, again. Tagged and in a separate notebook. Then I use my writing techniques to outline, write, draft, re-draft, and re-draft my speech. Pomodoro practice tops it off. Tournament schedules get plugged into Google Calendar, and since I need to pack the same things several times, I keep them separate and in a plastic storage bin. 
• One of my events is called Extemporaneous Speech, and for that I need to have articles from well respected publications available as sources. Since I only have 1/2 an hour to prepare, and no internet access, they have to be available on my computer in as organized a way as possible. Once again, Evernote. This system is complex, ordered list time!
1. Find source
2. Find RSS feed
3. Plug RSS feed into Full Feed Extractor (because some of them suck and only give previews)
4. Take new feed and plug it into If This, Then That. If This, Then That is a tool that automates web applications based on triggers. For example, if someone tags you in a photo on Facebook, it downloads the image to Dropbox. Highly recommend. In this case, I have a "New Feed Item" trigger, then it puts the feed item into Evernote
5. Make sure feed shows up in Evernote.
6. That's it
• Schoolwork- I do actually do my schoolwork! Those that know me will find this remarkable. Notes are all either typed directly into Evernote- every class has its own notebook- or transcribed out of a notebook. Evernote makes compiling exam reviews a breeze. Whenever I get an assignment, the due date is instantly put into Google Calendar, and I get reminders with a week left, a day left, twelve hours left, an hour left, and fifteen minutes left. It borders on paranoia/OCD, but it works. For physical handouts, printed material, and paper copies of notes, every class has a folder. They cost me $.50 from a dollar store.

That's it, that's how I manage being a college student.

The Coffee House Journals: What and Why

In every coffee house across the United States and Western Europe, there is a person between 16 and 31 years old, tapping away on a Macbook and smugly smiling at people trying to get their caffeine fix. If you ask them what they're writing, they'll respond with a condescending summary of a screenplay, novel, or business plan. These people are pretentious. I am also pretentious, but too cheap to go out and get coffee. So the writings and smugness end up here.

The "why" of things is very simple: I was told to. But, because I have a low tolerance for boredom and an impish and contrary nature, I'll try to have fun with it.

The "what" is somewhat more complicated. I've tried keeping blogs before, and the world has yet to recognize my genius. So, instead of random musings, we'll try structure and a semblance of reason.

• Monday- Speech. I have tournaments over the weekends, so new ideas for speeches, tournament rankings, and the interesting people involved will be covered on Mondays
• Tuesday- Productivity and Collaboration. I have the class this day, so it should be good.
• Wednesday- A response to an article in my RSS feed. They're generally about tech, but I have some recipe feeds, productivity feeds, and fashion feeds. I'll link to and properly attribute every article.
• Thursday- Writing prompts. I like writing, so I'll find an inspiration every week and put my response here. I would enjoy seeing others in comments.
• Friday- Grab bag. Friday will be interesting, I promise.
• Saturday/Sunday- Screw you I'm not doing homework on the weekends