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🎧 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.

🎧 Podcast 199: Evaluate Your “18 for 2018” List | Happier with Gretchen Rubin

Listened to Podcast 199: Evaluate Your “18 for 2018” List (We Reveal Our Own Successes and Failures), Plus an App for Finding Lost Items. by Gretchen Rubin and Elizabeth Craft from Gretchen Rubin

Evaluate your “18 for 2018” list, we reveal our own successes and failures with “18 for 2018,” plus a popular app for locating lost items.

Try This at Home: Evaluate your "18 for 2018." Looking back on the year, how did you do? What can you learn from what you did and didn't accomplish?

Elizabeth mentions the Happier in Hollywood Facebook Group. Lots of great discussion there.

Or check out my free Better app.

Happiness Hack: In response to the discussion in episode 197 about the person who refuses to keep keys in the key bowl, and so kept losing his keys, many people suggested the solution of the Tile app for keeping track of keys, wallet, TV remote control device, etc.

Read a review on the New York Times review site The Wirecutter here.

Gretchen's Demerit: This is a small, dumb demerit. I realized perfectly well that I kept running over my phone charger's cord with my office chair, and that this was a bad idea, but I did nothing to fix the situation—until my cord got wrapped up into the wheel, and I had to spend twenty minutes trying to get it out. Identify the problem!

Elizabeth's Gold Star: Elizabeth gives a gold star to an old friend in Kansas City, for arranging a gathering of old hometown friends over the holidays.

Trying out a new podcast after hearing a few people recommend it. I’ve read Gretchen’s Happiness book so I don’t expect it to be all bad, but I’m worried there’s more “fluff” in these than the sort of brass tacks bottom line productivity advice I’d really appreciate.

They’re certainly pushing out a lot of advertising in these, even for products that aren’t necessarily paying for time. It was just about what I expected. May sample a few more episodes, but likely playing at 1.40X speed.

🎧 ‘The Daily’: Watering Down Democrats’ Power in Wisconsin | New York Times

Listened to ‘The Daily’: Watering Down Democrats’ Power in Wisconsin from New York Times

Across the country, Democratic candidates for governor and attorney general have won seats that had long been held by Republicans. But Republican-controlled legislatures in some states are resisting that transfer of power.

This kind of crap really drives me crazy and is very non-democratic.

🎧 ‘The Daily’: The Anonymous Senior Administration Official | New York Times

Listened to ‘The Daily’: The Anonymous Senior Administration Official from New York Times

The New York Times published an account by an unnamed member of the Trump administration about resistance figures operating inside the government. “I would know,” the official wrote. “I am one of them.” The story behind an unsigned Op-Ed that describes a secret effort within the Trump administration to protect the country from the president.

🎧 ‘The Daily’: A 30-Year Plan to Transform the Courts | New York Times

Listened to ‘The Daily’: A 30-Year Plan to Transform the Courts from New York Times

Republicans have created a pipeline of conservative lawyers to help carry out a sweeping reconfiguration of the federal judiciary.

🎧 ‘The Daily’: When We Almost Stopped Climate Change | New York Times

Listened to ‘The Daily’: When We Almost Stopped Climate Change from New York Times

The U.S. had an opportunity to solve the climate crisis in the 1980s. What went wrong?

A great history of climate change over the past 30+ years. Interesting to see a lot of the needle move under Republicans while it’s come to a dead stop now.