CircleCount helps you better understand Google+

2013-04-04 09:05:56 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Just finished reading this book and found it to be a very accessible modern interpretation of ancient Tibetan proverbs. It underscores the importance of compassion in everyday life. Training in compassion guides the reader through the practice of Lojong and compassionate living with very little presumed knowledge of meditation required. The ancient proverbs can be confusing and contradictory when read without explanation, but Norman's many years of practice as a Zen priest helps us understand the deep importance of these proverbs and the impact they have on a joyous life.

2013-02-21 23:53:26 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

The letter: B in a setting that I am most familiar with. #markersdaily

2013-02-21 05:56:57 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

While waiting for +Daniel Sandler 's next #markersdaily prompt, I present past work by my 3yo daughter titled: Purple Princess.

2013-01-26 16:15:25 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 6 +1s)

I recently put together a Campagnolo EPS bike using mostly used components and documented the research that went into the build/buy decision and assembly process.  

I thought this might be useful for anyone who is considering a switch to electronic shifting, but is wary of the high prices associated with new Di2 and EPS bikes.

2013-01-26 16:05:17 (4 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

This is a project bike that attempts to fit a modern Campagnolo Record EPS groupset onto mostly used parts.  I was able to keep the budget far under the unbelievable cost of new Record EPS bikes and produce something that is nearly as light and just as fun to ride.

More details on how to go about assembling your own electronic shift bike are in this mini-site, based on the research gathered for this build: di2epsbuybuildguide

2012-10-29 03:27:48 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Norvig gives a lucid and date-driven approach to the political race: 

2012-10-03 21:54:57 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 3 +1s)

In DC for business travel and picked up some good run path trips from a neighbor who used to live there . This particular trail has lots of interesting buildings nearby. The cell phone pics don't really capture the full beauty.

2012-09-30 02:20:54 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 4 +1s)

This was a really fun obstacle course. It was a challenge to complete all obstacles and keep up a good pace during the run portions.  The Diablo Grande course had a lot of elevation change and some pretty steep sections.  Apart from the obvious difficulty of getting over 12' walls and scaling 30+ monkey bars, the biggest challenge was convincing my calves not to cramp up after all the hill climbs.  

The course was well stocked with water and banananas.  There was a headband, t-shirt and beer waiting for us at the finish.  This more than made up for the muscle convulsing shocks that we endured on the last obstacle.  

Most inspiring about this race is the sense of comradery on the course.  There were a few obstacles that couldn't be accomplished without help from strangers and everyone was willing and ready to lend a hand when needed.

2012-07-12 04:48:05 (4 comments, 1 reshares, 4 +1s)

Once Amazon can ship you something (plus tax) the same day you order it, what reason do we have to visit physical retail stores?

via +Kevin Fox

2012-07-03 02:38:22 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

Sound criticism of Data.gov and a few avenues for improvement in use and utility.

2012-06-29 14:11:33 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

2012-06-28 14:52:08 (1 comments, 1 reshares, 4 +1s)

social features as a catalyst for digital media migration and freedom

I'm sharing my story of bifurcated media management in the hopes that anyone else who is brave enough to migrate away from Apple multimedia software will find some useful tips.

tl:dr; After years of dividing my digital life into Apple software for media and Google software for productivity, I'm migrating (almost) everything to Google, reaping the benefits of social and liberation features that Apple lacks.

background
I've been using Apple software to store, manage and present my digital media for a little less than a decade.  I was an early adopter of iPhoto and iTunes and have mostly happy living a bifurcated digital life with all multimedia (photos, music, videos) primarily stored on a single Mac with on-demand export to Google services when I wanted to share somethingwi... more »

2012-06-25 20:03:37 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Jesse Ventura advocates removing party affiliations altogether, says forcing voters to educate themselves instead of looking for red / blue. -- The Stream (@AJStream)

2012-06-25 00:24:05 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

An outline for how a consumer-centric society might revive a spirit of citizenship and democratic participation.

2012-06-24 02:30:46 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 0 +1s)

John Hockenberry's talk is rooted in the concept of user intent anchoring the process of design, but poetically expands to encompass unexpected aspects of life in a way that only a rockstar author and performer like John could design. 

2012-06-23 19:57:44 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

Nice summary of the 2012 Personal Democracy Forum.

2012-06-22 05:25:57 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Q: How do I make great drip brewed coffee?
A: http://pinterest.com/billstr/drip-coffee/

2012-06-22 00:53:07 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Rides.tv offers an immersive story telling experience that is unlike anything I've seen before.  When you sign up to "watch" a show, you provide them with multiple points of contact (email, SMS, Facebook, etc) and the story evolves throughout the day via those points of contact.  

"Your cell phone rings. You answer. And as you eavesdrop on a call between an operator and an eyewitness, crime scene footage unspools on the screen. Then comes a text message from a character whose about to join the story. Later you might get an email. You get the idea."

2012-06-20 01:42:27 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

2012-06-20 01:25:17 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

Moderation, rhythm, knowledge. These are the tenants of the Slow Web movement.

2012-06-17 15:12:22 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

$57m in State dept grants are available to NGOs and individual developers who can create technology to help citizens in oppressive regimes communicate freely. 

"Officially, the U.S. says it abides by the U.N. process led by Kofi Annan and does not condone arms sales to opposition groups as long as there are U.N. observers in Syria. Nevertheless, as U.S. officials have revealed to Time, the Obama Administration has been providing media-technology training and support to Syrian dissidents by way of small nonprofits like the Institute for War & Peace Reporting and Freedom House."

2012-06-17 01:00:01 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

I have an urgent call for action. In AI-Class we broke all records with 160,000 students from nearly 200 countries. I would like to set a new record,  and I need your help. Please ask all your friend to sign up for Udacity Stats 101. It's, free, online, and I promise it's fun. (Ever heard about the Simpson's Paradox and its relation to UC Berkeley admissions?)
http://www.udacity.com/overview/Course/st101/CourseRev/1

2012-06-14 00:20:07 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Like coffee? Like to build and improve websites? Then you may enjoy helping +Craft Coffee make their site kick ass while drinking coffee.

2012-06-12 14:23:57 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 3 +1s)

This is a nice overview of the techniques that microsoft and google use to build entity databases for use search. These two approaches are similar but different in subtle but important ways.

This article offers a hint at how young this technology is and how it might evolve to really transform how we find information.

2012-06-03 02:46:06 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

+Lance Armstrong plays to win. Always.

2012-06-02 06:53:30 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Short interview with +Krishna Bharat 

2012-06-02 06:18:35 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

Some rambling thoughts on the news consumption space complete with mixed metaphors

2012-06-02 05:56:33 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Another piece in favor of disrupting a long-standing staple in primary education.  Rather than flipping instruction time and study time, Shelley Wright looks at the damaging effects of emphasizing memorization before understanding, application, analysis, evaluation and creativity.  

She makes a good argument for why creativity can be the starting point for all the other activities.  In some ways, putting mysterious and creative endeavors ahead of the other elements of learning encourages children to act more like basic researchers than sheep following a well-worn path. 

I wonder what the Montessori folks would have to say about this...

2012-06-02 04:41:47 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

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2012-06-02 04:37:51 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

The Terrible 20: Kickstarter Projects list is complete! From name tagging all the world's dolphins to developing sun screen lollipops, you guys came up with some truly terrible ideas.

2012-06-01 02:46:21 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

I was given the same prognosis a few years ago. My mile pace has never been the same.

Rough day. My cousin Tony was diagnosed with whatever the fuck it is that makes you wear those 5-toed rubber shoes. -- rob delaney (@robdelaney)

2012-06-01 00:47:57 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Strava users, now you can map all of your rides into a giant overlay map that is transparency coded by route frequency.

Try it at: http://www.jonathanokeeffe.com/strava/map.php.  The tool could use a bit of work, but it's nice to have this functionality available somewhere. 

h/t to +Brett Lider 

2012-05-31 21:25:26 (0 comments, 3 reshares, 4 +1s)

This is huge

2012-05-28 21:29:56 (6 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

I didn't know what the term "flipped classroom" meant but this infographic explains it very well. It sounds awesome. Imagine a world where the future generations were educated like this!

Essentially, (according to this definition linked-to below) the phrase Flipped Classroom refers to a paradigm where instead of lecturing in class and sending students home with homework - teachers create videos of their lectures for students to watch at home and then reserve classroom time for "homework" - activities done together. http://blogs.kqed.org/mindshift/2011/09/the-flipped-classroom-defined/

That's the background, some of the top blogs in this community (per http://plexusengine.com ) include the following:
* http://coolcatteacher.blogspot.com/ (by +Vicki Davis)
* http://www.thethinkingstick.com/ (by +Jeff Utecht )
*... more »

2012-05-26 02:15:52 (1 comments, 0 reshares, 3 +1s)

Quantifying how much input, output and rest your newborn is experiencing is vital to ensuring a healthy start. The hospital gives you a spreadsheet where all of this data can be logged, but I find it much easier to just press play & stop buttons on my phone :)

This app also summarizes and charts data that you need in order to make adjustments in food quantities. The data can be really useful during pediatrician visits.

#quantifiedself #quantifiedbaby

2012-05-23 06:03:11 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

It is time to decide what we will ask the American public next. Add your questions to the comment section in this post and be sure to share with others. We will use one of the questions to run a survey and share the results.

If you could ask the American public anything, what would it be?

2012-05-22 17:27:18 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

Tough Mudder NorCal (Diablo Grande) 2012... Who's in?

This year's (south) NorCal Tough Mudder obstacle course is a 12 mile jog through Patterson, CA with 25 military style obstacles along the way. Some of the obstacles are easy (crawling in the mud under an 8in high barbed wire) and some are really tough (crawling under barbed wire in cold water with live wires in the way) but the event is designed to test your mental resolve, encourage comradery among the participants and overcome your fears.

One of the best ways to commit yourself to doing something that you may be tempted to regret later, is to announce your intentions to others. Once people expect you to do something, it becomes more difficult to back out and disappoint. So on the eve of my second child's expected delivery date, I'm committing to run the Tough Mudder in late September and make sure that I... more »

2012-05-15 06:48:15 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

I just learned you can forward SMS spam to the "SPAM" short code (7726) and help the carriers fight it.

2012-05-09 02:11:23 (2 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

This weekend, I participated in the 2012 Wildflower olympic course triathlon with +Sani Obhodas, +Dan Pupius, +erinne lambden and several thousand other multi-talented athletes. This is a trip report chronicling my first experience training and participating in a triathlon.

The tl;dr version is well captured in Dan's beautifully shot photo collection [https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/111499016778755078481/albums/5739990486526456705] and activity details from the bike [http://app.strava.com/rides/8030200] and run portions [ http://app.strava.com/runs/8030198]


training
I didn't follow a regimented or prescribed training schedule for this event. I got the gist of a 10-week [1] and 12-week program [2] and knew that I should be able to comfortably complete 75% of the distances (consecutively) prior to race day. I was in good shape from last year's San Jose... more »

2012-05-02 17:15:17 (3 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

Who here’s been to Trevi Fountain? Now you can visit, anytime, with our new 3D photo tours feature for Google MapsGL. Need a crash course? http://youtu.be/uOFsYp7AtUs

To see more visit http://maps.google.com/phototours

2012-04-22 04:36:59 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 1 +1s)

The value of mental-training games may be speculative, as Dan Hurley writes in his article on the quest to make ourselves smarter, but there is another, easy-to-achieve, scientifically proven way to make yourself smarter. Go for a walk or a swim. For more than a decade, neuroscientists and physiologists have been gathering evidence of the beneficial relationship between exercise and brainpower. But the newest findings make it clear that this isn’t just a relationship; it is the relationship. Using sophisticated technologies to examine the workings of individual neurons — and the makeup of brain matter itself — scientists in just the past few months have discovered that exercise appears to build a brain that resists physical shrinkage and enhance cognitive flexibility. Exercise, the latest neuroscience suggests, does more to bolster thinking than thinking does.

2012-04-14 04:19:06 (4 comments, 0 reshares, 5 +1s)

My ChromeOS desktop looks suspiciously like +Will Norris's and both of us have a lot to learn by studying the app selection on +Louis Gray's machine. I think the most telling part about someone's Aura desktop is the order in which their launcher icons are arranged. Mine are arranged by some function of utility and frequency of use.

#showyourdesktopfriday #chromies #aura

2012-04-04 16:25:11 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

We think technology should work for you—to be there when you need it and get out of your way when you don’t.

A group of us from Google[x] started Project Glass to build this kind of technology, one that helps you explore and share your world, putting you back in the moment. We’re sharing this information now because we want to start a conversation and learn from your valuable input. So we took a few design photos to show what this technology could look like and created a video to demonstrate what it might enable you to do.

Please follow along as we share some of our ideas and stories. We’d love to hear yours, too. What would you like to see from Project Glass?

+Babak Parviz +Steve Lee +Sebastian Thrun

2012-04-01 04:23:40 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

Tap into the future of productivity with Gmail Tap for Android and iOS. Double your typing speed with this revolutionary new keyboard. #gmailtap

http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2012/03/introducing-gmail-tap.html

2012-04-01 04:15:18 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

I for one plan to wait for the Chromebook with multiple trackpads.

2012-03-31 17:13:42 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 2 +1s)

The chrome dev channel v19+ has a really neat feature enabled. From the start screen, you can see the tab URLs for all tabs on all other devices that you are signed into (with sync enabled).

That means access to temporary work on one device, from any other device, without the need to use permanent bookmarks.

2012-03-10 11:24:37 (0 comments, 1 reshares, 2 +1s)

+Tesla Motors owners seem to have some of the most creative personalized plates. Others that I've seen: "SOL POW" and "LOL OIL"

2012-03-06 20:59:08 (0 comments, 2 reshares, 2 +1s)

And that's how you shoot a commercial in one take.

2012-02-07 18:11:46 (0 comments, 0 reshares, 2 +1s)

If you have an ICS (ice cream sandwich) Android device, you should really give Chrome for Android a try. It's much faster and much better than the default browser

2012-01-24 08:15:42 (28 comments, 0 reshares, 0 +1s)

The debate over autonomous driving systems among car manufacturers appears to be one of incremental, gradual rollout or an all-at-once sea change that dramatically shifts public perception.

Today, you can buy a car that will park itself, adapt the cruise control speed to maintain a fixed distance to the car ahead of you, and gently steer you back into a lane before drifting out of it.

BMW is testing a car that appears stock (no spinning radar tower) that will drive itself autonomously along mapped roads in various traffic densities. One of the proposed safety measures involves requiring that a driver's hand be on the wheel at all times. Video: BMW highly automated driving mode.

What would it take for you to feel comfortable as a truly passive passenger in a autonomous vehicle?