When science is hands-on, it's always more fun.
Sleep Deprivation
How timely. This arrived in my inbox this morning from my employer's health benefits program. I write this with sniffling, post-nasal drip, sore throat and body aches. My observations are in red.
Did you know?The good news is my insurance offers an online program to help with your sleep issues. I wonder if I'll ever get around to signing up for it.
If you're one of the many people who are short on sleep, here are the some tips for getting a better night sleep:
- People who sleep fewer than 6 hours a night have a 50% increased risk of viral infections and an increased risk of heart disease and stroke (woke up sick)
- Sleep allows both the body and the brain to rest and heal. Without enough sleep the brain loses power and an individual will have problems with memory and concentration (and here I've been blaming all that time I was on Zoloft)
- Adults need 7-8 hours of sleep each night and school ages children/teens need at least 9-12 hours of sleep a night to be productive (I am lucky to get 6.5 during the week)
- Driving while sleepy can be just as dangerous as driving drunk, since your reaction time are slower when you a sleepy (been there,done that, DO NOT want the t-shirt)
If you are spending enough time in bed and still wake up tired or feeling sleepy during the day then you could have a sleep disorder that you should discuss with your doctor. Some signs of a sleep disorder are:
- Avoid stimulating activities within two hours of bedtime (does that include bedtime sex?)
- Avoid caffeine, nicotine, and alcohol in the evening (so, no after dinner coffee or wine with dinner?)
- Avoid going to bed on a full or empty stomach (I get home at 730, eat dinner about 8, in bed by 10)
- Stick to a regular sleep schedule (what counts as regular?)
- You consistently take more than 30 minutes each night to fall asleep
- You consistently awaken several times each night and then have trouble falling back to sleep
- Your bed partner says that when you sleep, you snore loudly, snort, gasp, make choking sounds or stop breathing for short periods of time while sleeping (no sleep apnea
here thank goodness!)
- You often feel sleepy during the day, you take frequent naps or you fall asleep at inappropriate times during the day (I thought that was just the sleep deprivation from lack of a good night's sleep)
DigitalLA and Digg present Crowd Source to Curation recap
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| From Drop Box |
- Laurie Sullivan (@LaurieSullivan) MediaPost Senior Writer. Online Media Daily, and Search Marketing Daily. @MediaPost
- Evan Greene, Recording Academy / Grammys (award winning We're All Fans campaign) @TheGrammys
- Kasia Cieplak-Mayr von Baldegg, Urgent Content, Strategic Producer. Urgent Content created and produced Flip Video's campaign for Cisco featuring Lenny Kravitz, Tony Hawk and curated UGC video commercials. (formerly, Producer, Current TV, Viewer Created Content Dept.) - @urgentcontent @faketv
- Chas Edwards, Digg. CRO & Publisher. @Digg - @chaznote - social curation at scale
- Jean Aw, NOTCOT.com founder. NOTCOT is a digital inspiration bulletin board for graphic designers @notcotModerator: Kevin Winston, Digital LA, founder @DigitalLA
How do you make sense of all the content?
Options: Human, algorithms, curation.
Laurie - blend of seaqrch engine (algorithm) and human curation. Each reporter is responsible for determining what is newsworthy.
Evan - aggressive and robust SM platform. Interact with artists, blended approach for topics to tweet about. "We're all fans " - campaign built fully by SM. People did the marketing to each other.
Viewership (of Grammys) went up for the telecast 35% in the teen demo
Kasia - Flip video campaign 15sec shots - people love to share video - facebook community - people "vote" and eventually videos like "David After Dentist" ends up on TV - when before it would have stayed on YouTube
Chas - Digg = personalized "newspaper" - more intimate experience
- Community "diggs " content, Digg does not determine what content is.
Jean - notcot is a Visual blog = human curation
Human curation
Visuals
News - What is newsworthy? Newspost everyone is responsible for their content
Curation is a judgement call
Ridley Scott's - Life in a Day- making a movie purely out of UGC - how would you edit something like that?
Fiction vs non-fiction curation -- a question of trust -- for example "Back to the Future" viral tweets
Verification takes time - Are we too busy? Content overload. What / who can you believe? How do you scale trust?
-- accountability (They Are your friends)
Facebook - what do you post that appeals to everyone in your groups?
Algorithms can handle query and "popularity contests" - counting numbers
Page rank, SEO / SEM, Semantics are very hard to program
Incentives I.e. "Facebook like"
- connection
- starts a conversation
- polling
- ownership (who owns what you create, how can you share it? Syndication? )
- intellectual property rights -- who gets compensated for UGC? If users generate and create the content, do they maintain the intellectual copyright to it, or does it become the property of the entity that requested it (i.e. video contests)
Digg - you watch the number get bigger (lol)
We want to post things and have people notice. Human feedback
Social media is about making connections
@oldspice making custom commercials - but he never tells you to buy old spice
UGC
incentive for ugc - contest - people becoming jaded, too many opportunities
Flip campaign - getting your message video out there
Teens watch more YouTube than TV, its how They connect and create community
Fame as an incentive
Q.A.
Big incestuous loop - best quote - re:content production
Popularity contests vs quality content
Massive engagement vs high quality
Ego vs fame -- ego very primal. Fame is more purposeful
For the whole show, you can watch the live stream provided by @techzulu
Live Videos by Ustream
Wordless Wednesday: Josh in Haiti
July 14, 2010
I grabbed this photo from Lancaster Pulse Ministries, the team that Josh went to Haiti with. This is one of the soccer clinic photos.
Wordless Wednesday: Hot gooey goodness
July 7, 2010
Nothing says summer better than s'mores.
Ingredients
1 large marshmallow
1 graham cracker
1 (1.5 ounce) bar chocolate candy bar
kabob for roasting marshmallow
Directions
1. Heat the marshmallow over an open flame until it begins to brown and melt.
2. Break the graham cracker in half.
3. Layer graham cracker, chocolate, marshmallow, graham cracker.
It's easiest to get the marshmallow off the kabob (or stick if camping) by sliding it off using gentle pressure from the top graham cracker.
His Name is AANG!
July 3, 2010
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| Noah Ringer as Aang in M. Night Shyamalan's The Last Airbender. (Photo credit: Wikipedia) |
Those were just the first few things that grated continuously on my nerves as I sat impatiently through The Last Airbender. I *really* wanted to
I sat impatiently because I was waiting for it to get good. I wanted to disbelieve the reviews, it couldn’t be that bad, right? When you have such a beloved series as Avatar:The Last Airbender, you do not rewrite and eff it up!!!
That’s two hours and $20 I will never get back. I can’t believe Nickelodeon signed off on this adaptation. None of Aang’s youthful playfulness is apparent. He’s moody and confused, apparently fighting the need to grieve (which does occur, but is not Aang’s overall attitude). The genuine affection and friendship between three of the five kids trying to save the world is dismally lacking, the scene between Sokka and Yue reminded me of Amidala and Anakin “Oh Ani you’re scaring me!” (Yes, it was that
To quote a few other people, it was rushed, the characters and story-line are not developed, you hop from one place to another and if you weren’t aware of the background or watched the series I am sure you would be lost. I was at some points.Well, it was more indignation and muttering under my breath with “he got that wrong and what the hell was he thinking and that didn’t happen and that comes later” … I’m sure you get the idea.
And of COURSE Shyamalan had to insert some twists and plot developments that weren’t in the original story. Hello, Zhao trying to assassinate Zuko? What universe did that happen in?
Momo and Appa did not get enough screen time. They are as integral to the story as any other character. Though I suppose in Book One: Water Appa doesn’t show how protective of Aang he can really be.
Save your money. If you haven’t bought the full DVD set yet, spend it on that.
And so, I leave off my tirade with …
Nickelodeon better reboot this and find another writer/director if they want the Avatar franchise to survive.
Oh, despite his over-acting, Zuko was well cast. You can only fit so much teenage angst, anger, and suffering into one character.
Starbucks has caved
July 1, 2010
... to the pressure of free Wi-Fi offered up by places like Panera and Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf. So now you can get some work done without being a card-carrying member of the Starbucks nation (of which I am one, but only because they are everywhere and I swear they put something in the mochas to make you addicted....) or without that pesky 2-hour limit (and people wonder why I tether...)
Anyway, it's a midafternoon slump, I think I'll go get some Wi-Fi, I mean coffee.
Tell Me Thursday - Disneyland
Disneyland is better with friends. Joy, Hank, and I (it's not cool for Josh to go to Disneyland with his mom anymore) joined a group of people with annual passes who go at least once a month (that is kinda the point of having an annual pass) and got to experience Disneyland in a whole new way. The best part, going on rides and exploring parts of Disneyland I never noticed nor experienced before -- like Sleeping Beauty's Castle Walkthrough and Davy Crockett's Canoes (not safe for the iPhone 4 by the way).
