Listen | Chris Aldrich

🎧 “The Daily”: Why Michael Cohen Lied to Congress | New York Times

Listened to "The Daily": Why Michael Cohen Lied to Congress by Michael Barbaro from New York Times

An admission by President Trump’s former lawyer about a proposed business deal in Russia sheds new light on where the special counsel investigation is headed.

How does this happen so late in the game?

🎧 “The Daily”: The Business of Selling Your Location | New York Times

Listened to "The Daily": The Business of Selling Your Location by Michael Barbaro from New York Times

Smartphone apps track a staggering amount of data about our whereabouts every day. That data has become a hot commodity.

Just the national security implications for this alone should require regulations of these tech companies.

🎧 Rachael Ray on Communicating Through the Medium of Food | Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

Listened to Rachael Ray on Communicating Through the Medium of Food from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

Rachael Ray knows how to relate over food. When she cooks, she's always thinking about her audience and how to communicate a message through the medium of food. Her energy and talent have led her to create a billion dollar lifestyle empire, built around the concept of fun, healthy, and joyous experiences with food. In this episode of Clear+Vivid, Rachael Ray and Alan Alda cook up some pasta together and enjoy a lively conversation around the dinner table!

This interview gives me a lot more respect for Rachel Ray and what she’s doing. On the surface she might appear to be too bright and too bubbly, but underneath she’s doing what all of the more serious-seeming foodies on television are doing (albeit perhaps even more successfully)–she’s just targeting a far different audience. But also now that I know this, I’m secretly wishing she would be doing some programming targeted directly at me.

I’ve been aware of Alan Alda’s work in the areas of science communication for a while, but his podcast and the subtle questions he’s asking are giving me greater respect for what he’s doing as well. We need several thousand more of him. We also need better curricula to improve these issues among scientists themselves. I remember needing to take at least three credits of writing intensive courses in college (far too few, but at least it was something), but it would be nice if all scientists and engineers were forced to have more basic training in communication at the lower levels.

🎧 W. Kamau Bell on How He Communicates with Racists by Alan AldaAlan Alda from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

Listened to W. Kamau Bell on How He Communicates with Racists by

Alan Alda from Clear+Vivid with Alan Alda (ART19)

W. Kamau Bell, the host of CNN's "United Shades of America,” describes his show as giving people a “microphone” and “public square to tell their version of the story.” Putting it plainly, he's said his greatest gift as a communicator is in knowing, “... how to shut the f*ck up and let people talk.” Kamau is a gifted stand up comedian who delivers his comedy through a socio-political lens. In this episode of Clear+Vivid, Alan Alda asks W. Kamau Bell about his approach to comedy and how it's possible to talk with someone who you genuinely disagree with, like a member of the KKK — and still find relatable qualities, even humor. Before they finish, Kamau surprises Alan with a guest of his own!

How can you not love W. Kamau Bell? This reminds me that I still ought to get back to watching his show more regularly instead of letting it fester on my DVR. This is my first episode of Alda’s podcast, but he has an excellent interview style and he’s obviously got some interesting guests. The broader topic of communication and conversation is also an intriguing one to me. I’ve added it to my podcast list to catch up on past and future episodes.

Hat tip: @sciphi

🎧 Episode 025 System Theories, Racism & Human Relationships: Interview with TK Coleman | Human Current

Listened to Episode 025 System Theories, Racism & Human Relationships by

Haley Campbell-Gross from Human Current

In this episode, Haley interviews TK Coleman to discuss how humans allow their conflicting mental models to influence the way they handle controversial topics like racism. TK also shares how understanding context and patterns within human systems ultimately empowers us to actively contribute to human progress.

I generally prefer the harder sciences among Human Current’s episodes, but even episodes on the applications in other areas are really solid. I’m glad to hear about TK Coleman’s overarching philosophy and the idea of “human beings” versus “human doings.”

Also glad to have the recommendation of General Systems Theory: Beginning With Wholes by Barbara G. Hanson as a more accessible text in comparison to Ludwig von Bertalanffy’s text. The gang at Human Current should set up an Amazon Affiliate link so that when I buy books they recommend (which happens frequently), it helps to support and underwrite their work.

Highlights, Quotes, Annotations, & Marginalia

Reality is objective, but meaning is contextual.

—Barbara Hanson, General Systems Theory: Beginning with Wholes quoted within the episode

This quote is an interesting recap of a sentence in the first two paragraphs of Claude Shannon’s The Mathematical Theory of Communication.

🎧 This Week in Google 481 Stoned on Cheese | TWIG.tv

Listened to This Week in Google 481 Stoned on Cheese by Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, Stacey Higginbotham from TWiT.tv

Foldable Phone, Online Civility

The Samsung Developers Conference Keynote features a foldable phone, SmartThings IoT, and Bixby innovations.

Android will support foldable phones.

Google employees stage a walkout over sexual harassment

Tim Berners-Lee's Contract for the Web

How to encourage civility online

YouTube Content ID

Facebook and "White Genocide"

Young people are deleting Facebook in droves

Facebook's holiday pop-up store

Everybody gets free Amazon shipping

Amazon's new HQ2(s)

8 new Chromebook features

Google Home Hub teams up with Sephora

Ajit Pai's FCC is hopping mad about robocalls

Picks of the Week

Jeff's Number: Black Friday home tech deals

Stacey's Thing: Extinct cables, Alexa Christmas Lights

Leo Laporte doesn’t talk about it directly within an IndieWeb specific framework, but he’s got an interesting discussion about YouTube Content ID that touches on the ideas of Journalism and IndieWeb and particularly as they relate to video, streaming video, and YouTube Live.

While most people are forced to rely on Google as their silo of choice for video and specifically live streaming video, he points out a painful single point of failure in their system with regard to copyright rules and Google’s automatic filters that could get a user/content creator permanently banned. Worse, as Leo indicates, this ban could also extend to related Google accounts (YouTube, Gmail, etc.) One is thus open to potential chilling effects of intimidation, censorship, and deplatforming.

Leo discusses the fact that he’s not as beholden to YouTube because he streams and hosts all of his content on his own website and only utilizes silos like YouTube as ancillary distribution. In IndieWeb parlance what he does is known as POSSE or Post to your Own Site, Syndicate Elsewhere and this prevents his journalism, commentary, and even his business from being ravaged by the whims of corporate entities whose rules he can’t control directly.

The discussion starts at 1:05:11 into the episode and goes for about 10 minutes for those who are interested in this particular sub-topic.

This idea also impinges on Cal Newport’s recent article Is YouTube Fundamental or Trivial? which I read the other day.

🎧 Episode 085 How Networks Learn An Interview with Cesar Hidalgo | Human Current

Listened to Episode 085 How Networks Learn An Interview with Cesar Hidalgo by

Haley Campbell-Gross from HumanCurrent

In this episode, Haley talks with physicist, complexity scientist, and MIT professor, Cesar Hidalgo. Hidalgo discusses his interest in the physics of networks and complex system science and shares why he believes these fields are so important. He talks about his book, Why Information Grows: The Evolution of Order, from Atoms to Economies, which takes a scientific look at global economic complexity. Hidalgo also shares how economic development is linked to making networks more knowledgeable.

Quotes from this episode:

“Thinking about complexity is important because people have a tendency to jump into micro explanations for macro phenomenon.” — Cesar Hidalgo

“I think complex systems give you not only some practical tools to think about the world, but also some sort of humbleness because you have to understand that your knowledge and understanding of how the systems work is always very limited and that humbleness gives you a different attitude and perspective and gives you some peace.” — Cesar Hidalgo

“The way that we think about entropy in physics and information theory come from different traditions and sometimes that causes a little bit of confusion, but at the end of the day it’s the number of different ways in which you can arrange something.” — Cesar Hidalgo

“To learn more complex activities you need more social reinforcement.” — Cesar Hidalgo

“When we lead groups we have to be clear about the goals and the main goal to keep in mind is that of learning.” — Cesar Hidalgo

“Everybody fails, but not everyone learns from their failures.” — Cesar Hidalgo

“Learning is not just something that is interesting to study, it is actually a goal.” — Cesar Hidalgo

A solid interview here with Cesar Hidalgo. His book has been incredibly influential on my thoughts for the past two years, so I obviously highly recommend it. He’s got a great description of entropy here. I was most surprised by his conversation about loneliness, but I have a gut feeling that’s he’s really caught onto something with his thesis.

I also appreciated about some of how he expanded on learning in the last portion of the interview. Definitely worth revisiting.