Category: personal AnGoL

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rePost::Seth's Blog: Is everyone entitled to their opinion?

I see an epidemic of bloggers who believe they have to have their take.
Yes It’s your right but it is also others rights to filter you out.
When some people say my belief in that is this. That doesn’t automatically mean they have the right to be factored in the conversation. If you don’t matter being the loudest screamer can’t get you anywhere. You are nothing.
 
The good thing is there is an out to this shithole. Be someone who matters. Create a body of work that in the words of Steve Martin “Be so good they can’t ignore you.” (Aside: Where in the world is my copy of Steve Martin’s Born Standing Up?).
 
If you matter then people will listen. I’m all fed up with the famous for being famous celebrity. Fuck That Shit.

Is everyone entitled to their opinion?
Perhaps, but that doesn’t mean we need to pay the slightest bit of attention.
There are two things that disqualify someone from being listened to:
1. Lack of Standing. If you are not a customer, a stakeholder or someone with significant leverage in spreading the word, we will ignore you. And we should.
When you walk up to an artist and tell her you don’t like her painting style, you should probably be ignored. If you’ve never purchased expensive original art, don’t own a gallery and don’t write an influential column in ArtNews, then by all means, you must be ignored.
If you’re working in Accounts Payable and you hate the company’s new logo, the people who created it should and must ignore your opinion. It just doesn’t matter to anyone but you.
I’m being deliberately harsh here for a reason. If we’re going to do great work, it means that some people aren’t going to like it. And if the people who don’t like it don’t have an impact on what happens to the work after it’s complete, the only recourse of someone doing great work is to ignore their opinion.
2. No Credibility. An opinion needs to be based on experience and expertise. I know you don’t like cilantro, but whether or not you like it is not extensible to the population at large. On the other hand, if you have a track record of matching the taste sensibility of my target market, then I very much want to hear what you think.
People with a history of bad judgment, people who are quick to jump to conclusions or believe in unicorns or who have limited experience in the market–these people are entitled to opinions, but it’s not clear that the creator of the work needs to hear them. They’ve disqualified themselves because the method they use for forming opinions about how the market will respond is suspect. The scientific method works, and if you’re willing to suspend it at will and just go with your angry gut, we don’t need to hear from you.
via Seth’s Blog: Is everyone entitled to their opinion?.

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Season 4 of Breaking Bad

Was busy the past few months and between family/friends, and rss feeds/books/series the former tends to win.
This makes for less blog posts, books read, programs done, and movies/television seen.
I actually watched the first two episodes of season 4 as it was being shown last year. I’ve been a fan since all the “The Wire” comparisons finally pushed me to watch the show and although I still love “The Wire” the most and believe that I haven’t seen a show that can match it Breaking Bad is an awesome show that deserves all the comparisons. The individual episodes of Breaking Bad if taken on its own have a higher entertainment value but when you take the arc from start to end is where The Wire is the stronger show.
Finished episodes 3-12 in about 10 hours.
The show was great and was only boring a handful of times. The tension was there although sometimes the circumstances make suspension of disbelief necessary.

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NBI Clearance Guesstimates of Undercapacity

The problem is that the government requires things it cannot give reliably and with the minimum fuss to its citizens.
I recently was required to get a NBI clearance and here is the deal.
According to their website they have 48 centers that handle between 2000 – 500 per day.
Because their main office are the probably the only place where they can handle 2000 people 2000*48 = 96000[1] people they can handle 100k people per day, given that we have
based on government statistics[2] here we have unemployed or roughly 2.9Million[3] and an underemployed people about 7Million[4].
Given that the BIR system for an upper bound can handle roughly 3.5 million people a day [5]
and that to be included in the unemployment statistics you need to be actively searching for a job this gives us about 2.9 million people who needs an nbi clearance for this year plus who ever is still looking for a job of the 7Million people whose nbi clearance has already expired.
Then NBI centers are barely enough to handle the demand.
What this shows is that the government has a systematic undercapacity to for services that it requires for one to get a job/travel/etc.
We need to demand better planning and better services from the government.
PS: Cross posting this to onthe8spot.com vince.
[1] The satellite office in malls and non big venues handle 500 people per day this makes the estimate very high. I believe a more accurate number could be pegged at 55K based on 1.5 k per regional/district office and 1000 for the satellite office and 500 for the mall offices.
[2] http://www.census.gov.ph/data/pressrelease/2012/lf1201tx.html
[3] 62,689,000 pool x 64.3 Labor force participation rate x 7.2 unemployment rate. I may be using these numbers incorrectly please correct me if you know better.
[4] 62,689,000 pool x 64.3 Labor force participation ratex 92.8 employment rate x 18.2 underemployment rate
[5] Estimate based on 96k * 365 , too high because 6 day work week and holidays.

http://www.pinoyeveryman.com/2012/03/stupid-stupid-stupid-government-squeezing-ofws/#comment-7286

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The American Scholar: Solitude and Leadership – William Deresiewicz

I hate reading stuff like this. It hurts too damn much.

Now that’s the third time I’ve used that word, concentrating. Concentrating, focusing. You can just as easily consider this lecture to be about concentration as about solitude. Think about what the word means. It means gathering yourself together into a single point rather than letting yourself be dispersed everywhere into a cloud of electronic and social input. It seems to me that Facebook and Twitter and YouTube—and just so you don’t think this is a generational thing, TV and radio and magazines and even newspapers, too—are all ultimately just an elaborate excuse to run away from yourself. To avoid the difficult and troubling questions that being human throws in your way. Am I doing the right thing with my life? Do I believe the things I was taught as a child? What do the words I live by—words like duty, honor, and country—really mean? Am I happy?
via The American Scholar: Solitude and Leadership – William Deresiewicz.

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Thoughts on the Visible Self

I’ve found myself recently doing things to not seem weird. This is because I’ve been recently going to work early and leaving work late. The leaving work late isn’t a new thing but the going to work early is. I’ve also been moving around the different deployments we have because the different people I need to consult are at different clients.
 
I’ve found myself a little subconscious of late. It seems to be because I’ve not had enough time to scout the surroundings and the people because most of the free time I have I either spend working/studying/skype with the GF.
 
Not wanting to alienate other people I’ve turned into a bland version of me.
 
It’s like I’ve pushed through the lizard brain with respect to work that the lizard brain that concerns the social/visible self has taken hold of that aspect of me.
 
 

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rePost::Five Lies I No Longer Believe | TODD HENRY

“COMFORT IS THE GOAL OF LIFE”
This is a pervasive and sinister belief that has – at times – caused me to compromise more than I should. When I aspire to comfort as the greatest goal of life, I refuse anything that might cause me pain or hardship, even if that means I have to abandon my pursuit of true north.
It is struggle that gives life its meaning, and the pauses and blessings that punctuate its landscape. Sometimes that struggle is against self and the laziness that craves only comfort. The creative process is a personal assault on the beachhead of apathy, and to succumb to the path of comfort is to turn our backs on the greatness that is on the other side of sacrifice. I refuse to allow comfort to be my ambition. Comfort is often the enemy of greatness.
via Five Lies I No Longer Believe | TODD HENRY.

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RANT::CTC FU

I’ve been very productive the past few days. It seems CTC the job is not as productivity draining as I originally imagined.
I’m CTCing because our clients are inflexible, indecisive, stubborn, know it alls, whose word is law.
No matter if they actually know less of the repercussions of their decisions.
 
If this continues I may have to find a new job.