🍪 Weekly bite - W33 - 🚀 Space Tourism Is a Waste
This week, taking a bite out of 🚀, 🔍, 🏖️, 🎶 & 🖥️
Hi,
and welcome to this week’s edition of the weekly bite.
In this edition:
Space Tourism Is a Waste
How to make your offline self harder to find online
Why vacations feel like they're over before they even start
All the Ways Spotify Tracks You—and How to Stop It (in short, you can’t)
Breaking Free from a “9 to 5” Culture
and some additional 🍬 Appetisers & 🧠 Brain game
Happy reading.
Regards,
Steven
Grab a coffee, take a bite.
7 min to chew through this one.
① Space Tourism Is a Waste
The race for space is on with Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson having taken their first flight in space, with Elon Musk planning to do so next year.
The idea of going to space sound nice, however, with each flight also the environment has to be considered. Each flight emits pollution directly into the stratosphere. Studies show this can deplete the ozone layer that protects us from harmful ultraviolet rays, the same ozone layer which we actually worked so hard on to restore. These companies claim to be investing in ways to reduce the environmental impact, but it has to be seen if it’ll be sufficient.
Also, they all make it sound like the missions are for the masses, but the price tags say otherwise, with prices ranging from $200.000 up to $28M. Rich people are already responsible for a disproportionate amount of carbon emissions. Globally, individuals in the richest 1% are already responsible for 175 times more greenhouse gas pollution than the average person in the bottom 10%. If space tourism takes off, it could make these disparities even worse.
It’s not to say that Space exploration is a bad thing. Space exploration can even help us understand the beginning of the universe, allowing us better understand our place in it. However, space exploration is not the same as space tourism which only serves the interest of the super-rich who want a thrill.
What’s more, it could widen the gap further by worsening the climate crisis and forcing the most vulnerable to suffer the impacts while the rich snap space selfies.
Lastly, the idea that space tourism could be the beginning of space colonization is absurd. It will be far easier to stop climate breakdown on Earth than it would be to build a large-scale civilization on Mars, where there isn’t even air to breathe.
We should be focusing all our efforts on securing a livable future on this planet—not celebrating flashy indulgences of billionaires at the edge of space.
Source: Gizmodo - 8 min read
② How to make your offline self harder to find online
It’s ok that you have an online presence, however, the key is that the information that is available on you should not aid malicious people with vulnerable access points that could lead to identity theft or losing access to your online accounts, like Facebook or worse, your email.
So what should you do?
Periodically, do an incognito search on your name, mail address, phone number, address,… In most cases, you will find results, but the information will be superficial and nothing to be alarmed by. If you do find sites that have tangible information on you, you can contact them under the GDPR right to be forgotten law to have your data removed.
In case you don’t want yourself to be found online at all, you can always opt for the removal of personal information by Google. Do note that Google will clear its search results, however, the sites that have information on you will still remain.
Tidy and secure your social media profiles. On Facebook, you can show your birth date, but keep your birth year hidden, and do make sure that you lock access to your profile to only those that you want to have access to. You can use the view profile as a stranger to check what information strangers have access to.
When registering to websites or newsletters, you can use a “spam” email address to keep your real one safe. For registrations that require the birth date, you could provide a fake one.
Actually one of the most important ones, enable 2-factor authentication for all the sites and apps that offer this possibility. Sure, it will require more effort to log in, but it’s well worth it if you consider the damage when losing access to your accounts.
One last piece of advice, do not use the same password for every website you register to. If one site is hacked, people could have access to all sites you are a member of. So use a different and strong password for every site, and log it into a password manager like LastPass or Bitwarden (which have free tiers).
If you’re wondering if your password was already “stolen” you can check Have I been Pwned.
Source: The Verge - 11 min read
③ Why vacations feel like they're over before they even start
You may have just had your vacation or you’re eagerly awaiting it. But when a vacation approaches, do you ever get the feeling that it’s almost over before it starts?
People from The Ohio State University conducted a study and found that about half of the people they surveyed indicated that their upcoming weekend trip felt like it would end as soon as it started.
It seems that the more people look forward to an event, the farther away it seems and shorter it feels. Ironically, longing for something seems to shrink its duration in the mind’s eye. Also, the idiom “time flies when you’re having fun” seems to come into play, which was proven when people were asked to watch a humorous or boring video (both with the same length), where the humorous one was being perceived as shorter.
This biased perception seems to be in all of us, relying on our subjective feelings – not objective measures of time.
So when looking forward to much-anticipated events like vacations, focus on the actual duration, reminding yourself just how many days it will last. You’ll get more out of the experience – and, hopefully, put yourself in a better position to take advantage of the time you do have.
Source: The Conversation - 9 min read
④ All the Ways Spotify Tracks You—and How to Stop It
Facebook and Google are the web’s biggest advertising powerhouses. But Spotify has ambitions to rival them. And it has all the data it needs to do just that.
I’m sure you’re aware that everything you do in Spotify’s web player and desktop and mobile apps is tracked. The music you listen to mirrors how you feel, who you’re with, and what you’re doing. To make the most of this, Spotify has invested heavily in data science and has even used people’s listening habits in its advertising.
“What's interesting is that the data from the paid users, who might never hear an ad in Spotify, also powers that logic engine.”
Additionally, Spotify collects your information when creating an account (username, email, phone number, date of birth, gender, street address, and country,…). If you pay, you’ll also give them your billing information. They can also get cookie data, IP addresses, the type of device you’re using, your browser type, your operating system, and information about some devices on your Wi-Fi network.
It can also get “motion-generated or orientation-generated mobile sensor data” from your device’s accelerometer or gyroscope. If you use its “Hey Spotify” voice controls, then it can also access these recordings (and your voice).
Spotify can even get extra information about you from other companies and services. If you log in with Facebook, for instance, it can “import your information” from there.
So in all, Spotify feels a lot more private than Facebook or other social media platforms as you don’t seem to be sharing anything, but still, you’re feeding its algorithms for personalization, troubleshooting, developing new features and technology, but importantly, also its advertising business.
What can you do about it?
You could start listening via a Private Session, but this doesn’t necessarily stop Spotify from logging that data. Via the desktop app and your account, you can also block certain tracking, and you can use a privacy browser to block third-party cookies, or on iOS, adapt your ad tracking transparency settings.
But ultimately, it’s impossible to use Spotify without it processing your data.
“To delete your personal data, you need to close your account,”
Source: Wired - 5 min read
⑤ Breaking Free from a “9 to 5” Culture
According to a Microsoft Work Trend Report (from 2020), the 9-to-5 workday is disappearing, as the increase in remote work has allowed for more flexible hours. Employees are increasingly working asynchronously, completing tasks on their own schedules, which may be different from those of their colleagues.
So how should an organization move toward an asynchronous way of working?
Start at the top
It needs to start with the leadership. Leaders need to walk the talk.
Focus on outcomes
Identifying clear goals and outcomes will allow employees working asynchronously to focus on the desired results versus when, where, or how the work is done.
Clarify what needs to be synchronous
Distinguish which tasks and activities are better conducted synchronously. These tend to be things like project kick-off meetings to set roles, responsibilities, expectations, and deadlines.
Challenge existing norms and assumptions
A work culture is full of unwritten rules and unexamined assumptions of how, where, and when things get done that often go unquestioned. Get rid of assumptions as “if I can’t see you working, then you must not be working,”
Make clear agreements and hold each other accountable
Make clear agreements around several elements, such as the use of various technologies and when these technologies are shut off, acceptable response times, and how urgent issues should be handled, etc.
Experiment, assess, and adjust
Start small by experimenting with new behaviours and see what works, what doesn’t, and how it feels.
Keep an eye on inclusion
Asynchronous work comes with both advantages and challenges with respect to diversity, equity, and inclusion. People will feel happier when they’re not extracted from their home communities if they can remain there and still be productive at your organizations.
Source: Harvard Business Review - 9 min read
🍬 Appetisers
Elon Musk Announces Humanoid 'TeslaBot' Prototype Robot Within a Year
Rain falls on peak of Greenland ice cap for first time on record
Spotify is testing a less restrictive ad-supported tier costing $0.99 a month
Apple TV+’s Upcoming Sci-Fi Epic Is Being Called ‘Game Of Thrones’ In Space
Chip Delivery Time Surpasses 20 Weeks in No Sign Shortage Easing (impacting mostly the automotive industry but also Apple and others feel the shortage)
🧠 Brain game
Which country has only 1 company in The Top 100 Companies of the World but even so claims the 3rd spot in total market cap value?
See for yourself at Visualcapitalist.
💡 Closing
I found these articles via Refind, a site & app that provides a daily curation (5-10) of various topics. Go check it out.