Friday, August 9, 2013
Wednesday, August 7, 2013
Stephen Fry Pens Moving Excoriation of Russia's 'Insane' Anti-Gay Law
In a poignant and powerful plea for immediate action, living legend Stephen Fry has called on the International Olympic Committee to institute an "absolute ban" on the Winter Games set to take place next year in Russia.
Addressing the IOC's members in a moving open letter published on his personal website, Fry urges the committee not to turn a blind eye to the injustices being committed by Russia against its LGBT residents, as the Olympics organizers did with Hitler in 1936.
The Olympic movement at that time paid precisely no attention to this evil and proceeded with the notorious Berlin Olympiad, which provided a stage for a gleeful Führer and only increased his status at home and abroad. It gave him confidence. All historians are agreed on that. What he did with that confidence we all know.Putin is eerily repeating this insane crime, only this time against LGBT Russians. Beatings, murders and humiliations are ignored by the police. Any defence or sane discussion of homosexuality is against the law.
Fry says it is not enough to simply guarantee the safety of foreign athletes — the IOC must "take a firm stance" on the matter by banning Sochi from holding the Games.
"Stage them elsewhere in Utah, Lillyhammer, anywhere you like. At all costs Putin cannot be seen to have the approval of the civilised world," Fry writes.
I am gay. I am a Jew. My mother lost over a dozen of her family to Hitler's anti-Semitism. Every time in Russia (and it is constantly) a gay teenager is forced into suicide, a lesbian "correctively" raped, gay men and women beaten to death by neo-Nazi thugs while the Russian police stand idly by, the world is diminished and I for one, weep anew at seeing history repeat itself."All that is needed for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing," so wrote Edmund Burke. Are you, the men and women of the IOC going to be those "good" who allow evil to triumph? [...]For there to be a Russian Winter Olympics would stain the movement forever and wipe away any of that glory. The Five Rings would finally be forever smeared, besmirched and ruined in the eyes of the civilised world.
The cultural icon in his own right goes on to remind the IOC of the "oaths and protocols" [pdf] it has sworn to uphold, including the promise to "act against any form of discrimination affecting the Olympic Movement."
[Putin] is making scapegoats of gay people, just as Hitler did Jews. He cannot be allowed to get away with it.
[photo via Getty]
Seven Rare Steve Jobs Videos That Show How To “Think Different”
Steve Jobs was skilled at many things--technology, marketing, and managing just for starters. But while his talents could be attributed to many factors, one that surely played a role in his success was his ability to consider things from perspectives no one had. Here are seven rare videos which span his career and take us behind the scenes of his famous slogan.
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About Product-Making
This video shows rare footage of Steve Jobs from 1980 giving a talk about starting Apple. What’s particularly striking is Jobs’s explanation of man’s skill as a toolmaker to amplify his inherent ability, which he says is why Apple was formed: not as many other companies were--to create a product--but instead to create tools that enhance man’s innate talents.
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About Intelligence
In this video from 1982 (actually, an audio-recording-as-video) Steve Jobs talks to the Academy of Achievement about what makes a person intelligent. He contends that a lot of it has to do with memory and the ability to make connections. However, he says in order to make connections that are innovative, a person must not have the same experiences as everyone else or else everyone will just be making the same connections. The key, he says, is to get an many different and wide-ranging experiences as possible.
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About The Concept Of Spending Money
As an entrepreneur, I know the dread you feel why you are going over the numbers deciding if you have enough to start a company. Indeed, “What if I spend all this money and I end up with nothing?” is a common refrain I hear whenever I talk to others deciding to go all-in on an original idea that more often than not has an equal chance of failing or succeeding. In this video of a talk Steve Wozniak gave to the Colorado School of Mines in 1984, Wozniak reflects on how Jobs turned the table on his thinking when he expressed the same fears. “Yeah, we [might] lose all our money,” Jobs told Woz, “but at least we’ll have a company.”
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About The Low Periods Of Industry Innovation
This is a great video from 1985 that shows Steve Jobs talking to academics from Lunds University in Sweden and it should be required viewing for anyone who says, “Yeah, but Apple hasn’t innovated in years!” Here Jobs talks about how the mid-1980s were seeing a lack of major advancements in the computer industry. However, he was quick to point out that all industries go through slow periods, though even when they do there is momentum behind that that eventually leads to new spurts of innovation. Extra points to the video for shows Jobs arriving by helicopter.
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About Asking For Help
This is perhaps my favorite Steve Jobs video. In it you see a bearded Jobs from 1994--one of the most powerful and creative people the technology industry has ever seen--speaking about not being afraid to ask for help. In Western society--especially in America--asking for help often has false connotations associated with it that you aren’t smart, clever, or rich enough to do it on your own. But Jobs knew there was no shame in asking for help and here explains that the ability to ask for help is often the difference between the people who accomplish something and the people who accomplish nothing.
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About Animation
This is a video of a keynote speech by Steve Jobs at Siggraph '95. In it, Jobs talks about an upcoming movie his new company, Pixar, is making called Toy Story. The speech is rare in that it shows Jobs's masterful understanding of industries other than technology. In this case, it’s the film industry. Here he opines that the future of films will increasingly rely on animation instead of its traditional role as just a tool for children’s films. This was a groundbreaking assertion in 1995, but today it seems obvious as virtually every film made today features some type of computer animation--with some relying completely on it.
Steve Jobs Thinks Different About Marketing
In this amazing speech from 1997 in a Town Hall meeting room on the company’s Cupertino campus, Steve Jobs launches the most iconic marketing campaign in the company’s history: “Think Different.” Jobs reflects on the difference between using marketing to sell a commodity and using marketing to impart the ethos of a company to its users. You can see the correlation between the Think Different campaign and the speech Jobs gave 17 years earlier about man’s role as a toolmaker. This is the birth of Apple conveying its ethos that the company is a simple toolmaker for people with the passion and ability to change the world. (Extra points to Steve for the dig against the milk industry).
Thanks to David Blake of Degreed, who suggested some of these videos. Degreed is a new service that helps users tell the story of their life's worth of learning and helps them track, measure, and share everything they learn. They have launched a series of case studies on the lives of interesting people, including Steve Jobs. The case study features 50+ articles, videos, and book excerpts that highlight the influences in his life, the pivotal moments in his education and career, and highlights his legacy today.
[Image: Flickr user Ben Stanfield]
Tuesday, August 6, 2013
Got baguette?
Mon dieu! New campaign urges French to eat more bread
Video: Just 100 years ago, the average Frenchman ate more than three entire baguettes a day, but today the average has declined to just a half, prompting a new campaign to encourage more baguette purchases. NBC’s Michelle Kosinski reports.
Got baguette?
The French are eating less bread these days, and bakers have launched a national campaign to fix that.
The average Frechman now eats half a baguette a day, compared to an entire loaf in 1970. A century ago, the average was a carb-loading three per day.
The trend to eat less bread is more pronounced among youth, a generation that can’t be bothered to stop by their local boulangerie after work to pick up a baguette. So bakers and millers have launched a new national campaign to encourage people to put away their pasta and pastries and eat more fresh, fat-free bread.
Modeled after America’s “Got milk?” campaign, the French are being asked: “Coucou, tu as pris le pain?” – or “Hey there, have you picked up the bread?”
The slogan can be found on billboards and inscribed on bread bags in cities around the nation.
“Eating habits are changing,” Bernard Valluis, co-president of the bakers’ and millers’ lobby, told the New York Times. “People are too busy or work too late to go to the bakery. Teenagers are skipping breakfast. Now when you see the word ‘coucou,’ we want it to be a reflex for consumers to say to themselves, ‘Ah, I have to buy bread today.' ”
But many said baguettes continue to be a French staple, and aren't disappearing any time soon.
“This is the breakfast of French champions,” Elaine Sciolino, the Times writer who wrote about the dilemma, explained to NBC's Michelle Kosinki.
Video: Just 100 years ago, the average Frenchman ate more than three entire baguettes a day, but today the average has declined to just a half, prompting a new campaign to encourage more baguette purchases. NBC’s Michelle Kosinski reports.
Monday, August 5, 2013
COULD DRINKING SOLVE THE POSTAL SERVICE'S FINANCIAL WOES?
THE AILING AGENCY HAS BEEN BRAINSTORMING WAYS TO RECOVER FROM ITS $16 BILLION LOSS IN 2012. ITS NEWEST IDEA: SENDING BOOZE IN THE MAIL.
The USPS's Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe has a new idea for how the ailing government agency can recover from the $16 billion deficit it suffered in 2012: Sending alcohol through the mail.
In an interview today, Donahoe told the Associated Press the USPS could raise as much as $50 million from annual alcohol deliveries. Mailing alcohol is currently illegal in the U.S., but in theory, the postal service would offer special boxes designed to hold bottles of wine, beer, or spirits that it could ship domestically for a flat rate.
Alcohol deliveries are the latest in a string of ideas we've heard come out of the USPS's brainstorming sessions. Among other options, it considered cutting Saturday mail deliveries, and is creating a proprietary “Rain Heat & Snow" fashion line of apparel and accessories.
Dating on the Autism Spectrum
What it's like to look for romance when "a big smile can be frightening"
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The former Miss America contestant and Juilliard-trained opera singer knew she had a different conception of romance than her previous boyfriends had and, for that matter, everyone else.
“People tend to think of romance as spur of the moment and exciting,” she told me. “I think of romance as things that make sense and are logical.” However, she didn't know why until this year when, at the age of 31, when she was diagnosed with autism.
The aspects of autism that can make everyday life challenging—reading social cues, understanding another's perspectives, making small talk and exchanging niceties—can be seriously magnified when it comes to dating. Though the American Psychiatric Association defines autism as a spectrum disorder—some people do not speak at all and have disabilities that make traditional relationships (let alone romantic ones) largely unfeasible, but there are also many who are on the "high-functioning" end and do have a clear desire for dating and romance.
Autism diagnosis rates have increased dramatically over the last two decades (the latest CDC reports show one in 50 children are diagnosed), and while much attention has been paid to early-intervention programs for toddlers and younger children, teens and adults with autism have largely been overlooked—especially when it comes to building romantic relationships.
Certain characteristics associated with the autism spectrum inherently go against typical dating norms. For example, while a "neuro-typical" person might think a bar is great place for a first date, it could be one of the worst spots for someone on the spectrum. Dorsey Massey, a social worker who helps run dating and social programs for adults with various intellectual disabilities, explained, “If it's a loud, crowded place, an individual on the spectrum may be uncomfortable or distracted.” Sensory issues may also make certain lights and noises especially unpleasant.
Seemingly basic, non-sexual touching may be an issue, as well.
“It may give them discomfort for someone to kiss them lightly or hold their hand,” Massey said. “They need pressure, and that's not typically what you think of with tender, romantic love.”
Perhaps because so much of their behavior runs counter to mainstream conceptions of how to express affection and love, people with autism are rarely considered in romantic contexts. A constant complaint among the individuals interviewed for this piece is the misconception that people with autism can't express love or care for others. “I think a lot of times someone will go out on a date with someone on the spectrum and think they’re a robot,” said Alex Plank, founder of WrongPlanet.net, a popular online autism community. “It's hard to read us if we don’t explicitly say what we're feeling, but all the feelings are there.”
In fact, people with autism may have greater emotional capacities. “Studies have shown that people with autism can have feelings that are stronger and deeper than those without autism,” said John Elder Robison, bestselling author of Look Me in the Eyes and autism advocate. “Yet those feelings may be invisible to outsiders because we don't show them. Because we don’t show them or the expected response, people make the wrong assumption about our depth of feeling about other people.”
It’s not that individuals on the spectrum do not have the same desire for love; they just may not know how to find it. Dr. Elizabeth Laugeson, an Assistant Clinical Professor at UCLA said, “If you asked a person with autism if they wanted a romantic relationship, they would probably say yes, but they would probably also say they don’t know how to.”
Partially from the emphasis on early intervention treatments, there's a dearth of dating skills programs, or, rather, effective ones for people on the spectrum. “Early intervention can significantly improve the outcome, but kids grow up, and we don't have the proper services,” said Laugeson, who serves as director of UCLA PEERS, a program that teaches social, including romantic, interaction skills to teens and young adults on the spectrum.
Central to PEERS is the promotion of “ecologically valid” social skills, traits humans have been shown to exhibit in reality, rather than what we think we're “supposed” to do. “We know people with autism think very concretely,” said Laugeson. “Social skills can be abstract behavior that's difficult to describe, but we try to break it into concrete steps.”
For example, PEERS will take the seemingly mundane, but actually complex act of flirting and translate it into a step-by-step lesson. “First, a couple notices each other across the room. They make eye contact and look away, and they look again and they look away,” said Laugeson. “The look away makes it known you're safe, but the common error someone with autism can make is to stare, which can seem predatory and scare a person.” People with autism are also specifically instructed how to smile and for how long, since “another common mistake is to smile really big rather than giving a slight smile,” said Laugeson. “A big smile can also be frightening.”
Neuro-typical people often take flirting for granted as a fairly organic, coy, and even fun back-and-forth, but for someone with autism, it is really a complex, nonsensical interaction. “Flirting still doesn't make sense to me. It seems like a waste of time,” said Plank, who worked on a video with Laugeson to teach his WrongPlanet community members how to flirt. “If you think about it logically, you say things you wouldn’t normally say, so it's harder. There are a whole other set of things you have to deal with.”
While he didn't have PEERS to guide him, in college, Plank studied guys who were always successful at picking up girls and started mimicking their behaviors. He quickly realized acting confident was the key to dating success, especially if you're a man.
However, maintaining that confidence may be the hardest part of dating for someone on the spectrum, because of their difficulty processing social cues from others. “We will constantly not be able to read whether someone is interested, so you can have an insecurity about whether the person you're dating likes you,” said Plank.
In heterosexual courtships where men are still often expected to pursue women, males with autism are at a distinct disadvantage to their female counterpart. “For guys on the spectrum it's a one-way thing,” said Robison. “We can be interested, but have no way to tell if they're interested in us.”
Some women with autism may ultimately have an edge in the dating world. A common trait of people on the spectrum is being extremely logical and straightforward. A blunt man may repulse women or get a slap in the face; think of how a woman would react if a date told her yes, she did look fat in that dress, or consider the famous 1989 study where a female researcher received positive responses to her request for sex from men on the street 69 to 75 percent of the times compared to her male counterpart who received not a single yes. Women who are forward are prized for it. “Especially if they're really attractive, neuro-typical guys appreciate when women are blunt,” said Plank.
While Penzvalto doesn't necessarily think women with autism have it easier than men, she has noticed that her neuro-typical dates have particularly valued many of her autistic traits. “I’ve found that people who are neuro-typical really appreciate the qualities that people on the spectrum posses: complete honesty and almost an inability to lie,” she said.
However, both sexes on the spectrum struggle equally with the fear of rejection. Since so much of dating for adults with autism is trial by error, the risk of mistakes, and often embarrassing ones, is high. Jeremy Hamburgh, a dating specialist for people with special needs, including those on the autism spectrum, has noticed how hard his clients take initial failure with dating. “The risk and rewards are very different for people who are neuro-typical,” he said. “The average neuro-typical person can go out and meet ten and do well with one and feel success, but for one with special needs who has been rejected all their life that can really hurt their self-esteem.”
Plank has witnessed friends on the spectrum too quickly walk away from dating for fear of rejection. “It's a numbers game in many ways and because people on the spectrum are black-and-white thinking, they think they're doing something wrong,” he said. “I wish more people on the spectrum knew you need to practice, you need to go out on more dates.”
Worse, is that people on the spectrum may turn the blame on themselves for not exhibiting neuro-typical norms for dating and romance. While interviewing subjects on the spectrum for his documentary Autism in Love (still in production), filmmaker Matt Fuller noticed how. “When something perceived as inappropriate, and it gets addressed, they will get embarrassed leading to a rabbit hole of self-deprecating thoughts.” And Penzvalto, too, remember feeling self-conscious and abnormal for her views of dating and romance. “I have struggled in the past with people telling me ‘this is how it should be’ and having sort of a crisis of maybe I just don’t get it, maybe I’m wrong,” she said
In fact, it was during one of those types of fights in a relationship earlier this year that Penzvalto decided to be evaluated for autism. She realized past boyfriends’ frustrations over her “rigid thinking” and “boundary issues,” could be explained by autism and a subsequent psychological evaluation confirmed it. However, rather than alarmed, she felt relief.
Perhaps because she had spent so much of her life trying to “act” normal and confine to others’ expectations for romance, knowing she had autism has helped her become more comfortable with dating. It’s a feeling not necessarily shared by all members on the spectrum, but realizing why she saw love and romance the way she does freed her from the pressure of neuro-typical standards. Now, she is following her own heart. “The number one freedom I found in the diagnosis is I don’t need to really give into a partner’s idea of what a relationship should or needs to look like,” she said. “It’s really liberating to know I’ve been living my life a certain way, and it turns out that that’s okay
”
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