Category: Lists

My 5 Best Purchases Of the Year So Far

I’m not a big shopper, but I do occasionally stumble across something that makes a genuine difference to my day-to-day life. Here are five from this year:

1) Netgear RBK50 Mesh Wifi System (£289)

I have a house with thick walls, so there is no chance the WiFi network from my router can span the whole house. In the past, I used an adapter that plugged into the electric sockets to extend the network.  The problem  was each plug created its own wifi zone, so I ended up with 5 zones in the house. This prevented me from connecting all my devices via wifi, which was a pain. Continue reading “My 5 Best Purchases Of the Year So Far”

Best Of the Web: Talking To Children, Belly Fat, Uber For Snitching and more…

I come across so many great articles on the web, so I thought I’d try to regularly share the best ones. Let me know if you like the selection or if you like more (or less) of certain types.

Personality and Self-Help (6)

How Emotional Intelligence Boosts Your Endurance
A new paper has found that those who were better at recognizing and regulating their emotions ran faster races. Runners who agreed with statements like “Expressing my emotions with words is not a problem for me” or “I often pause and think about my feelings.” turned out to be Continue reading “Best Of the Web: Talking To Children, Belly Fat, Uber For Snitching and more…”

7 Shows I Love on Netflix

With the sweltering heat, I’ve had more time indoors, which only means one thing: Netflix:

Stand-up comedy

Hannah Gadsby: Nanette – perhaps the most original stand-up comedy routine in years. Gadsby starts with a standard routine throwing out a joke a minute, but soon it gets meta. She starts talking about the structure of jokes and gives her earlier jokes as examples. She then gets serious Continue reading “7 Shows I Love on Netflix”

The Movies To Watch This Summer 2018

Last week, I wrote about books for the summer, this week I’m talking movies. There are loadsa great movies out this summer, but below are the ones that stand out – split into popcorn or thinking movies (!):

Popcorn movies

Incredibles 2. Some say the first Incredibles is the best super-hero movie ever made. I wouldn’t go that far, but it was a great a movie. The sequel comes 14 years after, and focuses on the mother character and Jack-Jack  (the baby)! It will surely be one of the best popcorn movies of the summer. Continue reading “The Movies To Watch This Summer 2018”

My Recommended Summer Reading List

The sun is out, summer is here, it’s time to read some great books. Here are my recommendations:

Fiction and memoirs

Educated by Tara Westover. I’m in the middle of this book based on a true story. Imagine a girl raised in the mountains by deeply conservative religion parents. That means no modern medicine, no secular education, no revealing clothes and no TV or music. The mountains were not Afghanistan, but the US and the parents were Mormons. Then throw the girl, the author Tara, into modern world when she starts university.  An incredibly insightful book of how our society operates, revealed through the eyes of someone who has never experienced it before. Continue reading “My Recommended Summer Reading List”

18 Must-Read Articles From Male Unemployment To Mind-Reading Robots

Politics

What is wrong with tolerance Great essay on the flaws of tolerance from its origins of protecting the dominant religious group  of a country to its flaw around tolerating intolerance. The essayist instead argues that societies should focus on reciprocal exchange. This is the process of understanding the benefits and responsibilities of each person to each other.

‘Governments don’t want us to think that protest has power’ Great interview of one of my favourite musical artists, Saul Williams. He talks about the power of language. His love of Shakespeare and Public Enemy. And the need for hip hop artists to reclaim their rebellious spirit rather than embracing the establishment. Continue reading “18 Must-Read Articles From Male Unemployment To Mind-Reading Robots”

My 23 Favourite Podcast Episodes So Far This Year

I’m a huge fan of podcasts. Listening to them forms part of my daily routine and I get many of my insights from them. I typically list my favourite podcasts, but this time I thought I’d list some of my favourite specific episodes. These may give you a springboard to enjoy the rest of the episodes of those podcasts. So here they are for this year (episode name first, followed by podcast name): Continue reading “My 23 Favourite Podcast Episodes So Far This Year”

22 China Stories That Caught My Eye

Tech

Deciphering China’s AI Dream An Oxford University study that systematically compares the state of AI in China vs the US. Punch-line “China’s AI capabilities are about half of those of America”

Huawei Probe Adds to U.S.-China Trade Tension Ahead of Talks The real trade war is happening in the tech sector as the US probes ZTE and Huawei – big Chinese tech companies. See President Xi’s response in next article.

Xi’s Speech at the Work Conference for Cybersecurity and Informatization . Well worth a read. China is desperate to become self-sufficient in tech hardware and not rely on the US or others. Continue reading “22 China Stories That Caught My Eye”

21 Must-Read Articles From Around the Web From Blockchain Bubbles to Chinese Values

I’m constantly scouring the web for good material to read and here’s my latest curated list:

Big Brother

Life Inside China’s Social Credit Laboratory Yikes. China has started to quantify people’s trustworthiness based on their “behaviour”. They then get a social credit score which determines their movements and services they can access. Continue reading “21 Must-Read Articles From Around the Web From Blockchain Bubbles to Chinese Values”