Category Archives: Uncategorized

Why Are There Few Women in Tech? Watch a Recruiting Session   ◆

Jessi Hempel in Wired, on a study of introductory sessions held by tech companies at a university (likely Stanford):

The chilling effect, according to Wynn, starts with the people companies send to staff recruiting sessions. As students entered, women were often setting up refreshments or raffles and doling out the swag in the back; the presenters were often men, and they rarely introduced the recruiters. If the company sent a female engineer, according to the paper, she often had no speaking role; alternatively, her role was to speak about the company’s culture, while her male peer tackled the tech challenges. Of the sessions Wynn’s research team observed, only 22 percent featured female engineers talking about technical work. When those women did speak, according to the sessions observed, male presenters tended to interrupt them.

The study may have focused on women, but I assure you other poorly represented groups notice similar things about their demographic.

Also:

The paper also describes recruiters using gender stereotypes. One online gaming company showed a slide of a woman wearing a red, skin-tight dress and holding a burning poker card to represent its product. Another company, which makes software to help construct computer graphics, only showed pictures of men—astronauts, computer technicians, soldiers. Presentations were often replete with pop-culture images intended to help them relate to students, but that furthered gender stereotypes. One internet startup, for example, showed an image of Gangnam style music videos that featured a male artist surrounded by scantily clad women.

How clueless does your recruiting team need to be to not flag and fix this?

Three is two, two is one, one is zero

You’ve probably heard the saying that “three is two, two is one, one is zero” in the context of survival strategies.

I use it in the context of data backups.

In my usage, if you have one copy of some data (a picture, a PDF, a document), you might as well have zero copies of that data: If it’s deleted or corrupted, you’re hosed.

If you have a backup, you have two copies of your data. But under the same principle, one backup means zero backups, if that backup goes south on you.

You want multiple copies of your data, and that means multiple backups. Where those backups are also makes a difference. There’s no point in having multiple backups if they’re all in the house that catches fire or is flooded, so having a remote backup is crucial.

I use a three level backup strategy that gives me some piece of mind. This might be overkill for some, but sometimes I feel it’s still not enough.

Most of my working data resides on my Apple 5K iMac. I have the following backups:

  1. Local, to an Apple AirPort Time Capsule. This creates hourly backups to a drive inside the house. It’s my first line of defense against stupidity. If I accidentally delete a file, I have a recent copy I can get to quickly and with a minimum of fuss.
  2. Local, to a Drobo 5D, using Cronosync to copy data daily. It’s meant as a redundant local backup in case something goes wrong with my Time Capsule.
  3. Offsite, to Backblaze. A remote copy is a requirement in case of physical damage to your local backups (such as fire, flood or theft).
  4. Off-site, to Dropbox for most (though not all) of my data. I limit this to “active” files due to storage limits with Dropbox (1 TB for $99/year for individuals). It’s technically not a backup because these are working files, but Dropbox keeps copies of any changed or deleted files for 30 days.

This gives me up to five copies of my data: the original, and four backups: two local, two remote.

(I actually have more than that, because I currently copy some of my Drobo 5D backups to a second Drobo, and some data gets synced to my computer at work, which itself has multiple backups,… but that’s too complicated to get into in any detail.)

The other piece of course is to test your backups.

For me this means occasionally trying to recover files from Time Machine on my Mac, opening files on my Drobo, and restoring files from Backblaze. There’s no point in having all these backups if I can’t actually get my data back.

Why do I have so many backups? Because I’ve lost data in the past, and I expect I’ll lose data in the future. Plus data recovery is expensive, and backups are cheap by comparison.

And they’ve saved my bacon before.

I can’t preach this any more loudly:
* Backup Your Data
* Test Your Backups

You can start slow. Backblaze is easiest because its inexpensive, unlimited, off-site, and automatic. Even Dropbox is better than nothing.

Just start.

I Made My Wife a Drink

My lovely wife came home feeling stressed from work. She really needed a drink and asked me to make her one. Her only requirements were “sweet” and “whiskey”.

Challenge accepted.

After taking a look around at my collection of stuff, I settled on the bottle of Galliano I had sitting around doing nothing. It’s a sweet Italian liquor that has a root-beer-y, vanilla-y, slightly anise-y flavor. It’s also bright yellow.

After some consideration, I decided to pair it with Bourbon, Woodford Reserve to be precise.

I thought adding some orange flavor might round things out. I poured in some orange juice, but after tasting it, realized that tarted up too much, and needed some taming. Grand Mariner to the rescue!

The wife  was pleased.

Mission Accomplished!

Instructions

Fill a coupe with ice and water. Set aside.

In a mixing glass half-filled with ice, add

  • 1 ounce of Woodford Reserve Bourbon

  • 1 ounce of Galliano

  • 1/4 ounce of orange juice

  • 1/4 ounce of Grand Mariner

  • 2 dashes of Regans’ No. 6 Orange Bitters

  • 2 dashes of Angostura Bitters

Stir vigorously for 20 – 30 seconds.

Dump the ice and water from the coupe, then strain the cocktail into it, and serve.

Dose of Sunshine cocktail.
I’m calling this Dose of Sunshine. Hit me up on Twitter (@jasonian) and let me know what you think.

“Tipping is ‘one of the biggest hoaxes pulled on an entire culture'”   ◆

Danny Meyer, founder of the Shake Shack burger chain:

“Tipping is actually one of the biggest hoaxes pulled on an entire culture, the American culture,” Meyer said. “The restaurant industry, as well as the Pullman train car industry, successfully petitioned the United States government to make a dispensation for our industries that we would not pay our servers. But it wasn’t considered slavery because we would ask our customers to pay tips.

“Therefore, no one could say they were being enslaved,” Meyer added. “And no surprise, most of the people who were working in service professional jobs and restaurants and Pullman train cars were African American.”

Whoa.

Realizing Black Male Success   ◆

R. L’Heureux Lewis-McCoy, writing for Ebony about “a comprehensive study of Black males who have excelled at college and beyond”:

The overwhelming majority of stories and studies that are concerned with Black males, from cradle to the grave, tend to look at what’s “wrong.” This type of approach is known as a deficit model because it assumes there is something wrong and often assumes that the problem lies within Black males. Deficit approaches usually pay lip service to social inequalities like poor schools, disproportionate policing, and an unstable job market. Yet these theories tend to suggest that once Black men get their act together, they can have the same access and opportunities as other Americans. This approach does little, if anything, to move Black men from the lower ranks of American society.

The CSREE study begins with an alternative perspective – a strength based approach. Rather than document ad nauseam what ensnares Black male mobility, the report asks what do Black males, their communities, and their schools do to ensure success? From this approach we see not just what is going right but how to expand these practices so more can excel.

Why the Election of 9 Black Female Judges in Alabama Matters   ◆

Lindsay Peoples, writing for The Cut:

In an unprecedented event, nine black women were elected as circuit and district judges in Jefferson County, Alabama, this November. For a predominantly Republican state, the Democratic sweep came as a surprise, as Alabama is one of the few states that judges still have to run on party lines to get elected.

Remarkable, not just for the fact that it happened in Alabama, but also that in 2017, it’s a story at all to have black women judges.

As one judge notes,

There’s never been an African-American woman on either the Alabama Supreme Court or the United States Supreme Court, so if President-elect Trump wants to invite me to do so, it would be a great honor. But I’m afraid that’s a bit far off in our nation’s history. Maybe I’ll be wrong; hopefully I’ll be wrong. But that’s where we are.

“An open letter to Trump from the US press corps”   ◆

Columbia Journalism Review:

While the Constitution protects the freedom of the press, it doesn’t dictate how the president must honor that; regular press conferences aren’t enshrined in the document.

But while you have every right to decide your ground rules for engaging with the press, we have some, too. It is, after all, our airtime and column inches that you are seeking to influence. We, not you, decide how best to serve our readers, listeners, and viewers. So think of what follows as a backgrounder on what to expect from us over the next four years.

It goes on to list eight “ground rules”:

  • Access is preferable, but not critical.
  • Off the record and other ground rules are ours—not yours—to set.
  • We decide how much airtime to give your spokespeople and surrogates.
  • We decide how much airtime to give your spokespeople and surrogates.
  • We’ll obsess over the details of government.
  • We will set higher standards for ourselves than ever before.
  • We’re going to work together.
  • We’re playing the long game.

That last one is my favorite:

We’re playing the long game. Best-case scenario, you’re going to be in this job for eight years. We’ve been around since the founding of the republic, and our role in this great democracy has been ratified and reinforced again and again and again. You have forced us to rethink the most fundamental questions about who we are and what we are here for. For that we are most grateful.

Enjoy your inauguration.

Brutal.

CNN goes out of its way to avoid the word “lie”   ◆

CNN headline following the first White House press briefing, where the press secretary outright lies several times:

White House press secretary attacks media for accurately reporting inauguration crowds

And from the article itself:

“This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period,” Spicer said, contradicting all available data.

Aerial photos have indicated that former president Barack Obama’s first inauguration attracted a much larger crowd. Nielsen ratings show that Obama also had a bigger television audience.

Spicer said, without any evidence, that some photos were “intentionally framed” to downplay Trump’s crowd.

He also expressed objections to specific Twitter posts from journalists. And he said, “we’re going to hold the press accountable,” partly by reaching the public through social networking sites.

His statement included several specific misstatements of fact in addition to the overarching one.

What’s remarkable to me is all the ways CNN tries to say “he lied” without once using the word “lie”:

  • “for accurately reporting”
  • “contradicting all available data”
  • “without any evidence”
  • “specific misstatements of fact”
  • “In fact”
  • “actually”

At some point, some major media publication will have to use the word “lie”, clearly and directly, in reference to this administration’s blatant and demonstrably false statements.

Also:

The CNN television network made a choice not to broadcast the Spicer statement live. Instead, the statement was monitored and then reported on after the fact.

This is how the media will have to deal with this administration: To the extent possible, don’t televise live anything coming out from the White House. Wait, fact check, and then broadcast, indicating the lies where necessary.

Advent Calendar Day 1: My Shot

There’s a grand tradition for those who celebrate Christmas: The Advent Calendar. Each day starting on December 1 and ending on Christmas Day, you open a flap on the calendar to reveal something: A poem, a candy treat, or a tchotchke.

(Yes, I recognize the irony of using a Yiddish word to describe a Christian celebration. I’m multicultural like that.)

Over the years, a new internet tradition has developed. Bloggers with large audiences create online advent calendars, with links to items that might generate a few shekels in referral fees.

I don’t have a large audience, but I’m gonna take a shot with this tradition anyway. So… starting today1, I’m writing about items I bought with my own hard-earned moola in 2016. Every item will be something I found interesting, useful, or just plain fun. I’ll link ’em up to Amazon or somewhere else you can buy ’em easily. And if you do, a few pennies get redirected to me, yet costs you nothing more.

And I make this pledge to you, my loyal reader: Whatever amount I generate from this brazen scheme, I will use it to buy something I love and will make me happy.

I promise.

My first pick will not come as a surprise if you’ve met me in person, as I’ve been obsessed with this musical since buying the CD in February. My friends and family have had to put up with me quoting lyrics from it at the slightest provocation.

I won’t make you wait for it: I’m talking about the original Broadway cast recording of Hamilton: An American Musical.

You’ve no doubt heard about this record-smashing hit musical. It won a Grammy. And a Pulitzer. And a Tony. OK, 11 Tonys. And tickets are virtually impossible to get2.

If by chance you haven’t heard about it, it’s “a story of America then, told by America now“. It’s a hip-hop history lesson on the life (and infamous death) of the ten-dollar Founding Father, Alexander Hamilton.

And it’s fucking brilliant.

I grew up listening to hip-hop. And I’ve always enjoyed musicals3. But I never thought those two could be combined, and I certainly didn’t imagine they could be combined well.

Turns out, the creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, is a genius (and not just because he took home a MacAurther “Genius” Award).

The music, story and lyrics are all sublime. A mix of hip-hop, R&B, traditional musicals and even some BritPop, the album rewards you for repeat listens. Even after nearly a year, and hundreds of plays, I still hear nuances, from musical motifs that pop up unexpectedly, to Miranda-as-Hamilton’s angry growl as he exclaims to George Washington during Meet Me Inside that detractors “take your name and rake it through the mmud!”

(When you’ve binged enough, you too can identify every single “yo!” used in the show.)

The brilliance doesn’t stop at Miranda’s work, though. The cast itself is phenomenal, starting with Leslie Odom, Jr as Aaron Burr (the damn fool that shot Hamilton), Phillipa Soo and Reneé Elise Goldsberry as two sisters, one he loves and marries, the other he just… loves, and Daveed Diggs fast-rapping his way through two very different roles.

(I’m unjustifiably proud that not only do I know most of the album’s lyrics, but I can actually do even Daveed’s fastest raps. That’s right, I match his practical, tactical brilliance.)

Of course, when you’re this obsessed, would it be enough to just listen to the cast album, non-stop? No, you will never be satisfied until you buy Hamilton: The Revolution, the behind-the-scenes book and libretto. It’s beautifully produced, with stories explaining how the sausage got made. You just assume that it happened, but this book really puts you in the room.

And then you find yourself wanting to read the biography of Hamilton that started Miranda down this crazy path, because you want to learn the real story about the man whose enemies destroyed his rep and America forget.

And then, and then, you learn Miranda decided to “reimagine” songs from the musical and collaborate with massive artists like The Roots and Busta Rhymes and Usher and Queen Latifah and Kelly Clarkson and Alicia Keys, and Ashanti and the end result is yet another drop of brilliance called The Hamilton Mixtape.

(Hearing Ja Rule and Ashanti do Helpless, knowing that Helpless was in part inspired by Ashanti and Ja Rule made me shudder.)

So, that’s the story of tonight, the first day of this advent calendar. I hope you’ll be back. I mean, how can you say no to this?

  1. The plan was to actually start on December 1, but life got in the way. ↩
  2. But I got some, in both San Francisco and New York! Woo! ↩
  3. I wish I could remember my first. It might be the movie version of The Sound of Music. Or the cast album for Jesus Christ Superstar. I honestly couldn’t say. ↩