Week 5 [02.12 - 08.12] Nintendo Switch - how to be the best, being the worst?

Nintendo Switch is a game console developed by Nintendo and released in 2017. As a successor of Nintendo WiiU, it develops the concept of combining mobile and stationary gaming. For me, this console is a phenomenon, because it proves that people don’t want only bigger and better looking games, but they want games which can give them joy. And Nintendo Switch can give a lot of joy!

Source: https://www.nintendo.com/content/dam/noa/en_US/hardware/switch/nintendo-switch-new-package/gallery/bundle_color_tabletop%20(2).jpg

Nintendo Switch is a hybrid console. Simply speaking, main hardware is a 6.2-inch tablet. In the box, we can also find a special dock and two controllers named Joy-Cons. The main concept of Switch is a possibility to change a style of gaming in a moment. For example, you play during travel in the portable mode which is possible because you can slip your joy-cons in the sides of the tablet. Then, after coming home if you want to continue playing on a bigger screen like TV, you can just pull out joy-cons, connect the tablet to a special dock and that’s it. A few seconds and you switch from mobile to stationary gaming. If a game has a local multiplayer mode, you can just give one of the joy-cons to your friend and just play together;  you receive a game console with two controllers which you can have whatever you want to. Isn’t that beautiful?

Source: https://d2z1w4aiblvrwu.cloudfront.net/ad/wi4Q/nintendo-switch-snow-day-large-8.jpg

After its premiere, Nintendo Switch was compared to the other eight generation consoles, i.e Xbox One and Playstation 4. When you compare specifications, Switch is just a poor rival with no power to deal with other game consoles. To be honest, the console is closer to phones and tablets than to current consoles. But even the best game console will fail without games. And in this field Switch is a definite favorite. Mario games, The Legend of Zelda and many, many indie games make this console the best option for everyone. Moreover, Switch has many more games with a local multiplayer than other modern game consoles. I hate the fact that I can't find any game other than FIFA or Call of Duty that I could play with another person in the same room and Switch is the best solution for parties or meetings.

WiiU - the predecessor of the Nintendo Switch

Source: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4a/Wii_U_Console_and_Gamepad.png/1920px-Wii_U_Console_and_Gamepad.png

To sum up, Nintendo Switch is a good example  proving that you don’t have to be stronger than your rivals to be better. Sometimes you just need to be different and find a different solution to achieve success. Poor hardware with atypical construction and  a large library of games for everyone can beat better graphics and larger open worlds. At this time I don’t have my own Switch, but I think that it’s just a matter of time.

• Do you have Nintendo Switch? If the answer is “yes”, how do you rate it?
• Do you think that graphics is the most important feature in games? Or do you value other features?
• What would your perfect game console look like?

Source:

https://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_Switch

https://www.nintendo.com/

Week 4 [18.11-24.11] Oscars controversies over the years

Oscars controversies over the years

With just less than a month until the official presentation of the 92nd Annual Academy Awards shortlist of nominees, the Oscars are already whipping the media into a frenzy; Journalists of various fields, ranging from acclaimed cinema reporters to celebrity gossip columnists, are discussing the event, which will be held in February at the famed Dolby Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles. Trophies will be handed, but more importantly, the ceremony is more than just a night of recognition for the industry itself; it’s always an occasion to spark a social or political debate, a pinnacle of celebrity fashion, and for some, a place to stir controversy.

The Oscars have a long history of all sorts of scandals: From Marlon Brando’s refusal to participate in the event in order to criticise the industry’s treatment of Native Americans to Kevin Hart’s fairly recent stepping down as the show’s host due to alleged homophobic remarks. But let’s take a look at some of those finest humorous moments:

At the 2000 Awards Matt Stone and Trey Parker – creators of the nominated South Park movie – have decided to throw the etiquette out the window and wear fancy dresses. The official dress code states that the participants should follow the 'black tie' formal wear – tuxedos and ballgowns - but it does not state any gender limitations. The result can be seen below:

The 1974  Oscars weren’t one of the most thrilling awards in their history, with the now-forgotten movie “The Sting” being named the best picture, but the ceremony will surely be remembered for its incident that occurred during the nominee presentation; a fame-seeking man decided to run across the stage fully naked – unfortunately for him, his performance wasn’t fully shown on air, but the live audience had a proper view. Surprisingly, the streaker wasn’t arrested and even held a press conference after his performance. As predicted, the incident made him a minor celebrity for some time after the event.

What can today be perceived as nothing significant or shocking seemed to be a big thing back in 2011: During her acceptance speech, Melissa Leo, an American actress known for her television work in the 80s, forgot herself and ‘dropped the F-bomb’, stating that watching Kate Winslet making her speech ‘looked so f-ing easy’. With language in the media becoming more and more foul, it might be surprising that such thing became a controversy just eight years ago.

My question for you is:

• ·      Do you watch the Oscars? Are you interested in the award?
• ·      Do you think that the background of such event like the Oscars or Golden Globes is as important as the nominees and awards themselves?
• ·      Do you have any predictions for this year’s awards?

Sources:

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/oscars-flashback-story-behind-streaker-682548

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/oscars-top-9-wackiest-moments-161150

Week 4 [18.11-24.11] Deep focus - 4 strategies for no distraction

Deep focus - 4 strategies for no distraction

• Multitasking is the enemy of productivity

Many people think that if they do many things at once, they are more productive. After all, they are constantly doing something, constantly producing new things. It can be said that it is a syndrome of being constantly busy. Nothing could be more wrong. Multitasking kills productivity. A study by Sophie Leroy at the University of Minnesota clearly shows what's going on when we do several things at once.
She divided the respondents into two groups, both had two tasks: solving puzzles in words and later making hypothetical employment decisions based on CVs. Group A was interrupted while solving puzzles and thrown into the second task. Group B had to finish the first task before proceeding to the second. Of course, the result was clear. Group A fared worse than Group B. The participants could not focus enough on the second task, having uncluttered puzzle-related things in their heads.
What's more, the researcher checked during the transition between tasks - how many words from the puzzle, participants remembered. Group A remembered much less than Group B because they had no chaos in their heads. So we came to the conclusion that if we do not do one task, we can do another worse, because we are not focused enough.

• Develop an informed work strategy.

Most of us have such a simple mode - we come to work, occupy our workplace and suddenly we do the right job. The passage is not visible, unconscious. Unfortunately, it also supports repetition of habits, looking into the phone, constantly changing topics. Start consciously implementing strategies that will support deep concentration. Two strategies can help:
Monk's strategy - as the name suggests, we cut ourselves off from the outside world. For example, we turn off WIFI, all kinds of notifications, put the phone in the "Do not disturb" mode, go to a hotel or other distant place (many writers use this technique), going to a cafe or library for the day.
Rhythmic strategy - it is about separating time windows after 1-2 hours of work in 100% concentration and e.g. a 10-minute break. Pomodoro applications can help you with this, where you set the working time and time for a break. It's best to start with something small, e.g. 25 minutes of work and a 5-minute break, so you don't get discouraged too soon :)

• Learn to focus in unusual situations.

A walk with the dog, travel by public transport, taking a shower - each of these situations is usually done automatically, in addition, when we do not think too much.Detriment! This is a good opportunity to break the pattern. Situations like these can fit the brain well. In doing so, we can, for example, focus on solving current problems at work or in private life, think about what I need to do to get better results in a given case. It will be difficult at first, but we see many benefits each time.

• Plan your free time.

One of the main mistakes that many people make is after a fairly ordered day of work there is total chaos. The day passes quickly.That is why it is important to plan your free time. For example, we set a fixed time of 20:00. Until then, after work, we deal with matters that are important to us, e.g. a swimming pool, gym, some courses. Generally, it is the time that you invest in yourself, but after this hour you can confidently focus your time on, for example, playing console, reading a book, watching TV series on Netflix etc.

Extra:

Questions:

1. How do you plan your time?
2. How do you organize your time after work?

Sources:

• https://lifehacker.com/train-your-brain-for-monk-like-focus-5895509
• https://www.inc.com/amy-vetter/why-you-should-close-your-eyes-at-work-other-tips-to-achieve-deep-focus.html
• https://www.itjones.com/blogs/2018/11/productivity-deep-work-multitasking

Week 4 [18.11 - 24.11] End of humanity

Have you ever wondered when or how would human species go extinct? Many people, especially sci-fi writers and modern scientists like to make up newer and newer explanations how our civilization will end.

One of the most known theory, which was especially popular during and soon after the Cold War, is extinction due to nuclear war. In a nutshell, it’s speculated that if Russia were to use its nuclear weapons and USA responded in the same manner (or vice versa), the Earth’s atmosphere would be completely destroyed and such phenomena like firestorms or nuclear winters would happen. What’s more, surviving population would be affected by incurable radiation sickness due to lack of any modern technology, which would be previously destroyed by electromagnetic pulses. Nothing pleasant.

"Nuclear mushroom" caused by one of the first thermonuclear bomb deployed - Castle Romeo

Another way in which humans could kill themselves is the biological weapon. It was never used in a large-scale conflict yet but fits in modern warfare types well. Instead of sending soldiers to the frontlines, just send some genetically modified bacteria or virus to do the job for them. If it were modified “too well”, such bacteria could get out of the control and kill humanity before any cure would be invented. Officially those types of weapon are prohibited by the international humanitarian law but we’ve already seen many cases of breaking it (i.e. terrorists) so it’s not that improbable.

Probably most popular reason nowadays and hopefully not caused by humanity itself is meteor crash. Even though the Earth’s atmosphere protects us from small asteroids hitting the planet (which actually happens quite often), it might not be able to endure collision with a larger object, and those surely exist. In 2018, an American foundation, called B612 Foundation, which was created to protect the Earth from interstellar threats reported that "It’s 100 per cent certain we’ll be hit [by a devastating asteroid], but we’re not 100 per cent certain when." In the same year even Stephen Hawking confirmed that asteroid collision is probably the biggest danger for life on earth. There’s actually the real chance that dangerous crash with asteroid named Bennu might occur in 2135. NASA has already deployed OSIRIS-REx spacecraft in order to collect samples from Bennu surface and determine if the threat is big.

Map of unharmful asteroid collision events

In the end I encourage you to watch a short TED video featuring an astronomer Martin Rees, who not only advertises his book but also describes how small and fragile we, as a civilization, are.

Questions:

1. Have you ever wondered if and how our civilization would end? If yes, what’s your theory?
2. Do you think countries from around the world would be able to join forces if any kind of interstellar threat, like huge asteroid, appeared?
3. What are your thoughts about dictatorship countries, like Iran or North Korea, which abuse international laws and work on the nuclear technology despite criticism from the international public opinion? Do you think they pose any threat to our species?

Sources:
https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/world-news/asteroids-earth-space-apocalypse-meteor-17133417
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_holocaust
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_warfare
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2018/03/19/theres-a-small-chance-an-asteroid-will-smack-into-earth-in-2135-nasa-is-working-on-a-plan/

Week 3 [04.11-10.11] Polish roads

Polish roads

Perhaps ‘Polish people’ would be more appropriate title for this article, because we are directly responsible for the current situation on Polish roads, which is getting worse, because the number of accidents increases during last years. In the context of the last accident in Bielany (for those who did not hear about it, here is a short information: https://www.tvn24.pl/tvn24-news-in-english,157,m/warsaw-man-fatally-hit-by-car-at-a-crosswalk-driver-charged,979277.html), the topic of safety on roads in our country returns.

Road infrastructure is constantly being modernized. Modern solutions in this area are still not as advanced and common as in Western Europe but they finally start to appear on our roads. An example of such solutions is, the so called, intelligent pedestrian crossings. They light up when they detect a pedestrian approaching them, what attracts attention of drivers and increases their caution. Another example, which is unfortunately not present on our roads is an active road hump. This type of solution can be found in Sweden or in the Czech city of Pilsen. The radar in front of a road hump measures the speed of cars and the hump itself, rises or lowers only in front of cars that drive too fast.

Actibump – active road hump

Source: https://bit.ly/2WjoKpN

Another aspect of road safety is road traffic law. Our government has recently enacted a law regarding zipper merge rule and emergency corridor. Obeying these rules is (or will be at the turn of 2019 and 2020) mandatory in our country. The zipper merge rule applies when two traffic lanes merge into one. Cars should be merging at the point of lane closure, allowing one car from the closing lane to merge into the open lane with that lane’s cars alternately. The emergency corridor relates to a situation in which, despite traffic congestion on a multi-lane road, it is necessary to allow the emergency services to reach victims. The rule itself is extremely simple, all vehicles on the outermost left lane drive as far to the left as possible. Everybody on the other lanes drives as far to the right as it is possible. Another law-related aspect of safety on our roads are tickets and especially its price. Current ticket prices have been in force since 1997 when the minimum wage was 391zł gross. The following chart presents percentage share of the highest speed penalty in average earnings in a given country for 2016 (countries on the chart, starting from the top, are as follows: Italy, Hungary, Great Britain, Slovakia, France, the Czech Republic, Spain, Romania, Germany, Poland).

Source: https://bit.ly/2Jq7Ssc

All safety features in modern cars also contribute to safety on our roads. However, this is such a vast topic that I should write another 400 words to cover it at least partially. I will mention only the V2V (Vehicle to Vehicle) technology, thanks to which it would be possible, for example, to overtake at corners, because the car would know that there are no obstacles behind it and the maneuver would be safe. Sounds great, isn’t it? And this is just one, not the most useful example of using this technology. Here is a short video about V2V communication.

Do you feel safe on Polish roads?

What should be done to increase safety?

Or maybe we should do nothing, because autonomous vehicles will take care of our road safety sooner than later?

Sources:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actibump 
• https://www.nhtsa.gov/technology-innovation/vehicle-vehicle-communication
• http://statystyka.policja.pl/st/ruch-drogowy/76562,Wypadki-drogowe-raporty-roczne.html

Week 3 [04.11-10.11] Sleep Debt - What is it and why it is important to take care of sleep?

Sleep Debt - What is it and why it is important to take care of sleep?

First, let's explain what Sleep Debt is - it is a growing sleep deficit, i.e. the accumulation of sleep deprivation from each subsequent night, including the accumulation of effects it brings. This can be compared to a bank loan, in which, apart from the loan itself, the interest rate must also be repaid. In sleep, the consequences can be pathetic and even fatal.
Here are 3 common misunderstandings and facts: 

1. We think our body will adapt

The human body is amazing! Its special feature is flexibility. It can adapt to a warm, cold, dry, tropical environment, it can eat meat, but also not. Thanks to this, we are able to obtain various information from various places around the world. What does this have to do with sleep? Well, it has quite a lot.I assume that each of us had a sleepless night and then walked all day like zombies. We call this syndrome Micro Sleep Debt, which can be quickly repaid. Just sleep the same or the next one. Often among the people you hear: "I got used to a 6-hour sleep and that's enough for me!" - well, it may work in a short time, but in the long run, the body will start "crisis management", which will cause:
- micro dreaming
- overeating
- limiting contacts with other people,
- slowed metabolism
- focus on survival.

2. Lack of sleep is not responsible for all diseases of the world

It's not like people who sleep well don't get sick, but they get sick much less often. People suffering from lack of sleep have a disturbed hormonal balance, which means that they have reduced immunity, an increase in cortisol, which in turn means that fat and water are accumulated, which can lead to obesity, and appetite is also disturbed.

 

3. Debt can kill you

Concentration, or rather not enough, can be tragic. For example, while driving a car. The fatigue that our body feels due to lack of sleep can cause that for a split second our senses are turned off, which with driving a car can lead to an accident and, as a consequence, even death. Another thing can be increased irritation, which often leads to limiting contacts with other people, lack of patience, quarrels. This, in turn, can lead to a disorder of self-esteem, which often means depression.

Okay, we know what Sleep Debt is and what the consequences of it can be, now I will give you some points on how to recover from it:
- Take care of regular sleep - from 7 to 9 hours.
- Falling asleep supports melatonin secretion - limit your phone / computer sitting at least an hour before bedtime.
- If we sleep well, we exercise better and vice versa :)
- Keep the bedroom dark, quiet and cool.
- Make sure nothing disturbs your sleep.
- Do not drink coffee 10 hours before bedtime and do not eat heavy meals for 4 hours before bedtime.

Question for you:

1. Do you have trouble sleeping?
2. How much do you try to fall asleep? Do you do short naps during the day?
3. Do you use any applications, devices such as Smart Wear to analyze sleep?

Sources:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2892834/
https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/8/eaar8590
https://www.health.harvard.edu/womens-health/repaying-your-sleep-debt
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_debt