Capitalogix

The Oxford Comma: Still Important, Even If Oxford Doesn't Think So

Grammar isn't everyone's cup of tea ... but it's something I spend a lot of time thinking about. 

Should I use an ellipsis here or a dash? Is this an unnecessary parenthetical?

Because of that,  the serial comma (commonly known as the Oxford comma) is surprisingly important to me. 

If you don't know what an Oxford comma is, it is the comma before the word "and" at the end of a list. 

I love it (and use it). I think it adds clarity in most situations, and while some lists make sense without it, it is helpful if not necessary in many lists.

Like below: 

 

Who wants that?

Use the Oxford Comma ...  Save yourselves the imagery. 

If you need a guide of when to use it, Check out this infographic ... Click it to see the whole thing. 

 

via PRDaily

A Beautiful Rendition of Hallelujah

Sometimes the real thing is worth paying attention to ...

In a world of fake news and technologically enhanced music, this performance of Hallelujah should do the trick. 

Watch and listen to K.D. Lang sing Leonard Cohen.

 

 via Tower of Song: A Memorial Tribute to Leonard Cohen

Masterful!

A Look Back at "The Crazy Ones"

I remember being mesmerized the first time I saw Apple Computers iconic "Crazy Ones" video as part of their Think Different campaign.

Steve Jobs originally recorded a version of "The Crazy Ones" himself, but chose to release the Richard Dreyfuss narrated version. 

 

via YouTube

Here is the text version of the script.

 

Here's to the crazy ones.
The misfits.
The rebels.
The troublemakers.
The round pegs in the square holes.

The ones who see things differently.

They're not fond of rules.
And they have no respect for the status quo.

You can quote them, disagree with them,
glorify or vilify them.
About the only thing you can't do is ignore them.

Because they change things.

They push the human race forward.

While some may see them as the crazy ones,
we see genius.

Because the people who are crazy enough to think
they can change the world, are the ones who do.

    –     © 1997 Apple Computer, Inc.

Click here for extra material about the video and campaign. 

I think it has held up pretty well, and I had this piece of art commissioned for my office. 

There's a lot to be said for carving your own path, for pushing past perceived limits and accomplishing something hard to ignore.  

 

An Investment Guaranteed to Pay Dividends

I think about investments a lot ... that makes sense given my profession.

Yet, as my kids get older, there is an investment I made that paid-off in a big way ... and I want to share it with you.

Like many parents, I wanted to teach my children that, to a large extent, they control what happens to them. One of the first ways I did that was to set up a "compensation system" for them to earn video games.

Some parents try to limit the amount of time their kids spend watching TV or playing video games. I tried something different.  Instead, my kids earned their games by reading books.  Here is a photo from way back then.

 

 

Paid With Play.

Here's how it worked. When they were younger, 10 books was enough to earn a small game. When they finished a book, it was their right, and my obligation, to take them to the bookstore for us to pick up the next book together. Likewise, when they finished the requisite number of books, it was their right, and my obligation, to take them to the computer store or game store for them to choose any game they wanted.

When they finished a hundred books, they got a bonus of earning the next game system. That meant if they had a Nintendo, they could now also get a PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360.

How Can You Encourage a Jump to the Next Level?

There came a point when I wanted one of my sons to start reading grown-up books. He was comfortable reading a certain type of book, and didn't want to read the kind of books that I read.  So, I created a bonus system that counted a particular book as three books.  I didn't force him; I just let the easier path to a reward "whisper" in his ear what to read. Once he finished that, he never went back to teen fiction.

It Is a Great Way to Learn About Your Kids.

I also used the bookstore visits to get a sense of how the boys were doing. For example, I might say "I notice that you read five books in that series, maybe you'd like this book".  Or, "That sure is a lot of science fiction; what was the last biography you read?"  For the most part, though, I didn't care what they read.  The key was to get them to want to choose certain books for their own reasons.  Ultimately, their preference meant they were learning to love reading.

It Puts Them In Control of Their Destiny and Rewards.

My younger son likes competition. He also broke or misplaced many things. So, in order to earn back the Game Boy unit that he lost, I challenged him to read five books in five days. These weren't easy books either. It was designed to stretch him, and also to teach him that he could read a book a night. The bet was that he either finished all the books in the allocated time, or none of them counted towards games or Game Boys. On the other hand, if he read a book a night for two weeks, not only would he get to have his Game Boy back, the books would count towards a game too. It worked like a charm, and we were both happy.

So, Who Got the Better Bargain?

As they started to get into their teenage years, I needed to up the ante a little. So, 500 books meant they got a laptop of their choice. Both boys cashed in ... and probably felt like they were taking advantage of their dad.

I got what I wanted, though; both my boys love reading.  And know that they can accomplish anything they put their minds to … one step at a time.

 

 

That's an investment that pays dividends for a long time.

  

Executing Your Vivid Vision of the Future

Many companies have flashy mission and vision statements. Fewer have mission or vision statements that truly capture the spirit of the business or inspire proper action.

Likewise, some companies have identified their core values (but fewer have identified the values that truly represent the business and what it aspires to become) ... and even fewer have real actionable plans to get where they say they are going. 

This is easily fixed!

Cameron Herold is famous for helping entrepreneurs and other organizational leaders translate their "Vivid Vision" into a complete and actionable roadmap for their companies. 

He originally presented the Vivid Vision exercise in a chapter of his book, the Double Double.

The basic idea is that most entrepreneurs have an idea in their mind of what the company will look and feel like in the future (literally, a Vivid Vision),  but that employees can't read their mind.  The exercise translates those ideas into actionable direction.

Here is a short video of Cameron explaining the process. 

 

It's a fun and useful exercise.  Ultimately, you end up with a 4-5 page document.  Here is an example of Cameron's Vivid Vision for himself.  This can be used internally, for recruiting, and as a way to align with stakeholders.

He just released his fourth book  (called "Vivid Vision") – and it goes into more detail on how to align your business around a shared vision of the future.  It's terrific ... and surprisingly short.

And, if you want help generating or writing your vivid vision ... email Jennifer Hudye.  She can write it from scratch or take your draft and make it “pop”.  Tell her Howard sent you.

Cameron also has a podcast and offers some tools and exercises you can download.

Pro Tip: You're Not An Author

I love books … bookshelf after bookshelf confirms that (I’ve even read most of them!)

So far, however, none of the books on those shelves were written by me.

Not surprisingly, it’s a lot easier to read one than write one.

The Internet makes being a bestseller seem easy, and writing the book even easier. It feels like everyone and their mother has a book.

But it’s not that easy.

After reading several posts on writing books, listening to experts, talking with friends that have written them, I’ve tried a lot of different approaches. I’ve transcribed speeches and presentations, I’ve chronicled dozens of stories on key points, etc. I've used book writing software, voice transcription services, grammar checkers, and even text expansion software, trying to make it easier. 

I've spent more time not writing a book than many successful authors spent from start to finish.

Technology makes most things easier and faster … but, whether we’re talking about writing a book or a trading algorithm, at some point, you realize that it’s not enough to use tools, you also have to know how to use them.

If you don’t have the right skills and knowledge, tools only help you create garbage faster.

That is where Tucker Max and Book in a Box come in ... When it's time to write your book, they can help.

Tucker Max has written 4 Best Sellers (for himself) with 3 on the Best Sellers’ List at the same time.

Here is an interview I did with Tucker about the book-writing process, and why it can be hard, even for very smart people, to write a book. 

 

via YouTube

Are you planning on writing a book?

I am!

 

Who Can You Trust? Ranking Your News Sources

Fake news this ... phony sources that ...

It is harder than ever to know what to trust.

"Noise Reduction" is important in this volatile geo-political climate.

The chart, below,  lists the least and most trusted news sources.

 

via RJI

As someone who reads a lot, this was interesting.

As a side note,  I was a little surprised to see the "Internet" on the list as source itself.  Darwin would be somewhat comforted to see that people don't trust everything they see on the internet. 

The following chart is a bit outdated (it's from 2014), but it's a good study with diverse leanings.  It presents the trust levels of various news sources by ideological group.   

 

via Journalism

Which of your news sources do you follow? Were they as trusted as you expected?

Another question worth asking yourself is "Am I getting an idea of what the other side is thinking?"  In trading, I always want to understand what the other side sees.

Finally, let me know if there are resources you think I should look at.  

You are either growing or dying.

What Languages are the Most Spoken - The Results Might Surprise You

There are over 7,100 known languages actively spoken in the world today. Of those, just twenty-three of them act as a mother tongue for more than 50 million people.  Collectively, those 23 languages make up the native tongue of more than half the world (4.1 billion people).

This infographic represent each language within black borders and then provide the numbers of native speakers (in millions) by country. The coloring shows how the languages have taken root in many different regions.

 

 via Alberto Lucas López .

 

As you can see, Chinese is by far the most dominant language on the planet right now, with almost 1.2 billion people speaking dialects. Comparatively, pretty much every other language on Earth is an also-ran: Spanish (399 million speakers), English (335 million), Hindi (260 million), and Arabic (242 million) take up the next four positions. Only when you add them up do they come close to the reach Chinese has.

Although Chinese is the most popular language on Earth, it's worth noting that its influence wanes greatly outside of Asia.

If you take the geographic diversity of where a language is spoken into account, English, Spanish, French, and Portuguese are the most influential languages on Earth, because of colonialism.

For more, here is a link to the Washington Post's article: The world’s languages, in 7 maps and charts.

Wisdom in the Age of Information: The Future of Story-Telling

“We live in a world awash of information, but we seem to face a growing scarcity of wisdom,” states Maria Popova, Founder of the website Brain Pickings.

She believes that stories—in the broadest sense of the word—shape the meaning and momentum of everyday life.

 

 

 via YouTube.

Stories will never die, but the ways we tell them are changing.

Interesting.

What It Is Like to Prepare to Speak at a TEDx Conference (Part 2)

To use an athletic analogy, a normal speech and a TED Talk are totally different events (like a sprint vs the decathlon).  It takes a surprisingly different set of skills and type of preparation to perform well.

I've given hundreds of presentations, and don't normally stress about them.  I did for this one.

 

  
In most of my talks, there is very little "set in stone" to memorize.  I tend to have a main topic (or theme), and each slide serves like a module ... and I think, talk, interact, and improvise throughout the framework.

This works well for me because I tend to think in anecdotes that branch out from the main theme. That may be a great skill to have, but it's not one that helps you write a good TED Talk.

Why?  Because, in contrast, a TED Talk is really about "one idea worth sharing".  

In many respects, it's much harder to write and deliver a good 10 minutes about one idea, than it is to prepare to talk about a much broader topic for one hour.

 

My wife, son, and me at the TEDx Plano event

 

The TEDx committee created a sense of formality with stringent standards and deadlines.  My guess is that, during the planning and rehearsal  process, they wanted uncomfortable speakers to provoke better speeches.

As a result, I prepared (and threw away) four separate talks before coming up with something that felt right and flowed properly.

Here are some bullet points that highlight lessons learned.

• One of my early listeners coached me that the trick to a good TED Talk is that it is not about what you say, but rather about what they feel. In other words, for a TED Talk, evaluate the story and the particular wording choices based on the emotions they elicit in listeners.
• One of the best ways to get a point across emotionally is to tell a story.  And, if I couldn't remember it easily, it probably wasn't a story.
• The speech committee and several early listeners strongly encouraged me to go with as few slides as possible. I started with 15 ... I got it down to six  ... and I ended up with two (relying, instead, on the performance and connection rather than images and words).
• They encouraged me to take almost everything about business (in general) or my business (specifically) out of the talk.
• In fact, they kept encouraging me to make it simpler and more basic on almost every level. "Why did you say that?" I would answer; and they would say "Then say that."

I didn't realize how hard it was to make something simple.

The video should be ready next week.

 

EDIT: Here it is:

Related articles

How to Create and Deliver a TED talk

How to prepare and deliver a TEDx talk

What It Is Like to Prepare to Speak at a TEDx Conference (Part 1)