"Tell Santa I Want an Amazon Kindle*"

Here is an interesting link which talks about e-books versus regular books.  In particular it predicts that books will largely be replaced by e-books. I agree with a lot of the points in the article which I referenced above.
I am particularly pleased as well with the ability to have all of the books I need for church on my phone.  I used to bring a backpack with a few books and a notebook for notes.  Now all I need is my phone.  Plus I can access my electronic notes for future reference.

Here is the downside: there are lots of (legal) ways to read books for free. Using the library is easy, and in many cases the library has hot recent books. Physical books can also be lent and borrowed. A Kindle book can really only be legally used on the book owner's device. It's much cheaper for me to read new books, as much as possible, by checking them out from the library.



*In case Santa comes across this post, I don't actually want an Amazon Kindle.  I have been very spoiled this year on electronics.

Is a Double Major Worth It?

I had a double major in college. Ultimately, my life has taken me in a good direction, and I enjoyed learning lots of things. But no, I don't think it was worth it. I would just major in math if I had to do it again. Here is an interesting article on the topic.

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Should I Get Rid of My Cable?

I have recently pondered cutting my cable bill out of my budget and looking at lower cost options.

• Netflix: I currently have this service.  I get movies and old TV shows.  Some of these I can get streamed directly to my TV.  It costs about $10 a month.
• Watching shows the next day on the Internet: This is free.  This includes services such as Hulu.  I can either watch these on my laptop or connect the laptop to my TV via an HDMI cable, which tends to be low quality.  This option does not include a lot of cable shows as well as a lot of live sporting events.
• Hulu Plus: This is a new service from Hulu.  For about $10 a month, I would be able to get TV shows streamed to my TV in high definition.  This includes current seasons of many popular TV shows.
• Apple TV: With this device (which is about $100), one can rent TV shows for about $1 per episode as well as movies.  This is actually not a serious option because I would rather pay $10 for unlimited episodes instead of $1 per rental episode on Apple.

Ultimately, my wife and I like things such as Food Network and ESPN too much to give up cable.  We'll probably just stick with cable plus Netflix and call it good.

Is Rosetta Stone Worth It?

At Costco recently I passed by the Rosetta Stone software.  I stopped to look at the price: it is expensive.  I realized that that price is a reflection of the value people place on knowing a language.  Rosetta Stone is, from my perspective, the most well-known language learning software.  I tried it at my school's language learning lab for free, and I didn't really like it.  In contrast to my experience learning Portuguese as a missionary in Brazil, I felt like Rosetta Stone was not very efficient for me.  On this note, I have recently been looking at some language learning websites which I think are better than Rosetta Stone.  Surprisingly, these websites can be used for free for the basic version of the site, which is what I have been using, or for a small fee for the premium version.

• LiveMocha is a website that offers lessons which, for the most part, are similar to that of Rosetta Stone.  One feature I have enjoyed is that you can get your practice exercises corrected by native speakers.  You either write something out or record your pronunciation of a few sentences, submit it, and native speakers, who are using the site to learn English or another language, will correct it.  The cost is that you have to correct someone else's English assignments.  I have found it easy to correct a basic level English assignment.
  
  One feature with LiveMocha which I have not used is the chat feature.  One can find "language partners" to chat with to practice the language.  For example, if I am learning Portuguese, I can find someone who speaks Portuguese who is learning English and chat with them.  Friends can help one to learn a language a lot faster.
  
• Lang-8 is a website which does not do what Rosetta Stone does.  It may be better for the more advanced learner.  What you do is you write a small post in the language you are learning.  It can be about anything.  You can write about your day, about a movie you saw, or anything else that you might normally blog about.  Then, like with LiveMocha, someone corrects your writing.  In return, you correct someone else's English writing.  This is a simple website but it has a powerful idea.  I have been pleased with the things I am able to learn with it.  And again, it is free to use the basic version.

In conclusion, I would not invest in Rosetta Stone.  In addition to these websites, I am aware of other websites which also do a good job; none of them costs nearly as much as Rosetta Stone, and most of them are probably at least as good if not better than it.  In addition to this, there are things like language learning podcasts, blogs in other languages, and other foriegn-language material available for free online.

Is Snuck Not a Word?

I recently noticed that my Internet spell check didn't have the word "snuck" in it.  As I type this, snuck stands with a squiggly red line under it.  I googled it and found that indeed it is not the proper past participle of sneak.  One would more properly say, "I sneaked into the room," or, "I had sneaked into the room," instead of, "I snuck into the room," or, "I had snuck into the room".  However, as I found here, the usage of snuck instead of sneak has become so pervasive over the past 20 or so years that it can no longer be said that snuck is non-standard usage of the verb to sneak.  So there.

German Coast Guard Video

Here it is:

How to Take Notes in the 21st Century

I have been trying to figure out how to best utilize technology to take notes.  Since I am a college student, I have the task of taking notes for classes.  I also go to academic talks.  I also attend other sorts of meetings where note taking might be useful (for example, church meetings).

The traditional way is to use pen/pencil and paper.  There are various techniques for efficiently using ones notes, and that I will not go into.  In the past, I have only needed notes for a class during the period I took the class.  After I had taken the final exam, my notes became useless to me (from my perspective).  As I have progressed in my education, I have needed the information contained in notes more and more, especially in the future.

As I researched this subject, I have found that this is why people use filing systems.  I probably sound quite naive in saying that, but I guess I never had the study skills to get to the point of needed a file system.  I put together a quick and simple filing system for some of my math notes.

With some other subjects, however, I found that a filing system seemed too inefficient.  For example, with my study of the scriptures, there are so many different topics and categories to place notes in that creating a physical filing system would be a lot of work; also, I don't have space in my apartment for a large filing system.  I have, therefore, been playing around with electronic solutions to this problem.  Having all of my notes in an electronic format would benefit me because I would be able to arrange said notes with much greater ease.  Further, if I needed to put together a talk, as I did in this post, it is easier to copy and paste bits from document files than it is to copy those bits from a printed source.  Finally, I can access my filing system via a portable device and call up information wherever I go; with a large physical filing system I can't do that.

I would be interested to see someone who has this concept down better than I do.  To a point, I am collecting things electronically with the expectation that in the future there will be something much better which will can utilize my electronic files.

Public Speaking

Yesterday I had to speak in church.  I have not had to speak in church for over three years.  Also, I am not a good public speaker anyway.  However, I am an experienced audience member to many church talks.  I have thought for a long time how I can deliver a good talk when called upon.  In studying this principle, here is what I came up with.

• Prepare beforehand
• This should be a no-brainer.  A good talk can be delivered on short notice, however, as I am not a strong speaker, I wouldn't want to risk giving a poor talk because I failed to prepare.
• At the same time, prepare to be flexible.  It is common to run out of time or to simply feel inspired to change ones message.
• Don't start with negative statements
• Sometimes people start by mentioning how unprepared they are, or how the or not a good speaker, and that we, the audience, should "bear with" them.  This, ironically, has the opposite effect, and causes people to pay less attention to the talk.
• Voice and appearance
• Vary tone of voice to add emphasis and color to the talk
• Smile
• Exude confidence
• If you don't have confidence, "fake it until you make it"
• Share stories and personal experiences
• From Marcus Sheridan, "Delivering an Effective Talk," Ensign, Aug. 2010, 42-43
  "When we share a powerful story or personal experience, our message can have a lasting impact on our listeners. People love to hear stories. That’s why heads pop up and attention increases when we share them."
• Have a collection of notes to draw things from
• I keep a habit of studying every day.  As it is a good study habit, I take notes.  It is much easier to prepare a talk when I already have good material stored up in an organized set of notes.
• Explain things well
• Explain the context of quotes used
• Given a general audience (like mine yesterday) it is nice to explain things in a way that even the most uninformed listener can understand
• Don't exceed the time limit
• "The difference between an interesting meeting and a boring meeting is five minutes"
• I don't know why, but when a meeting goes over, my mind automatically turns off.  I know that this is the case for most people as well.

I tried to incorporate these principles into my talk yesterday, and I felt good for having completed the assignment.  I'm just not sure that very many in the audience paid attention to my talk as there was a large quantity of small children in the congregation yesterday.

Book Report

I recently read two books which struck me as books that are for me.

1. Soccernomics: This book used economic analysis to analyze soccer.  I enjoy sports, and having double-majored in economics, I enjoy rudimentary economic analysis.  Here are a few (but not all) interesting points the book makes:
• Soccer (really professional sports as a whole) is a poorly-run business.  For example, a team will fire its coach after one bad season and then hire a new coach within a couple weeks.  In the real world, companies spend months interviewing candidates for a high-level position.
• Soccer is so popular around the world because when the English introduced it to many of their colonies.  American football, on the other hand, is not something which the United States has been too keen to export.  Americans seem content to like football without caring what the rest of the world thinks of it.
• Having a professional team does not benefit a city's economy.  It does, however, increase the level of happiness of its citizens in a statistically significant way.  Further, this as well as having large international sporting competitions in which ones country is a participants is shown to decrease suicide rates.  This subject reminded me of my childhood basketball team, the Seattle SuperSonics, who moved away from Seattle, in part, because the city did not want to pay to build them a new arena.  The point I took away in relation to the Sonics was that although the team would not make up the arena money by stimulating economic activity, having the team was a benefit to the community in a significant way.

2. Eating the Dinosaur: It is hard for me to describe exactly what this book was about.  It talked a lot about popular culture.  It referenced a lot of things in which I am interested—for example, the podcast This American Life, the TV show Friday Night Lights, basketball, football, music, etc.  It talked about some things that I hadn't really thought hard about—for example, what is the deal with laugh tracks?  It generally looked at things in an interesting way.  I would recommend this book to those who have some of the same tastes as I do.

An example of why I am not good at explaining things...

It came to my attention that in my last post I made it sound like I was going on a strict regimen of work, blocking out all other concerns.  Here are a couple points:

1. I just don't have the gift of explaining things well.  I know that.  Therefore, it is not surprising that my last post was misunderstood.
2. My point was that by dedicating myself to working for a set period of time, and not outside that set period of time, that I hope to achieve more AND have the free time to dedicate to my family or other private interests.  I definitely value having balance in my life and not letting work consume me.

Having Free Time

I Googled across an interesting article about productivity and priorities.  It presents the case studies of a few people who impose upon themselves a fixed schedule. They decide that they will work during a fixed set of hours—let's say, for example, something like 8:30 A.M. to 5:30 P.M., Monday through Friday—and then they don't waver from that.  These are people whose lines of work would otherwise influence them to work long hours; for example, my current profession, graduate student, is one such profession; I have to set my own schedule, and I have to produce results from said schedule.

In my experience, there is a lot of pressure to work long hours.  It stands to reason that the more I work on something, the better I will be at it.  I can think of many people in other fields for whom this is the case; Michael Jordan, famously, dribbled a basketball around with him everywhere after he was cut from his freshman basketball team tryouts.  When I was a high-school wrestler, I was told the story of Dan Gable, who after winning the national championship in his weight class, instead of celebrating, was seen that very night jogging, preparing for the next big tournament. The book Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell, talks about the 10,000-hour rule; people who are masters in their fields typically have put in at least 10,000 hours of work to become masters.  I have been taught, either directly or indirectly, that one must work tirelessly to rise to the top of one's field.

The article I have linked makes an interesting point.  By forcing themselves to be constrained, the people in the article put themselves under pressure to do the most important and most efficient tasks possible.  It was interesting to read how once people implemented a fixed schedule they actually improved their overall production even though they were now working less hours.

I am going to implement this idea and see how it works.  It is definitely something I need.

Addendum:
The story of The Fisherman and the Businessman seems appropriate for this topic.

Riskopoly

I am a fan of board games.  Some time ago, I came across rules for a game called Riskopoly.  Here is a set of rules.  The game is essentially both Risk and Monopoly at the same time.  Players gain money from their Monopoly properties as well as their Risk territories in order to buy armies.  With these armies, players try to conquer the world.  I have never played this game, but I would be interested in trying.  The major hurdle is that since both Risk and Monopoly are notoriously long, such a game would be even longer.  It is a tall order to find people who would be interested in making the time investment necessary to play this game.

If I one day complete a game of Riskopoly, I might try next Settlers of Riskopoly.

Also, I wonder what other board games could be combined to form even better games?

Projects

As I was working on one of my newest projects, I peered over at my bookshelf and noticed a book I bought to work on another project which I had long since abandoned. I realized how often I start ambitious projects to improve myself in some way, only to abandon them once the demands of every day life get to me. My new goal is going to be to stick to my projects.

I make this goal with one caveat: I need to pick projects which are absolutely the most important and best uses of my time. Virtually every ambitious project that. I can imagine is a "good" use of my time. Some of these projects are better than others. The key for me is to figure out which projects are the best uses of my time. The ideal is for me to identify this early so that I don't have keep quitting something that I started.

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