Creating certain types of files and compiling programs are two time intensive tasks I normally perform. As these tasks are also resource heavy, rather than stare at the progress bars, I turn to my phone and play a round of Bejeweled Blitz or Angry Birds or check my Twitter feed... all of which add to the data glut. Mind you, these activities are innocuous- I'm filling time rather than wasting it staring at progress bars. I'm guessing that the activities I choose to fill the time might be considered a waste of time, but as I have a feel for how long certain process require, Angry Birds & Co. keep me alert and sharp.
The odd thing is that quite often my "decompress" time after work is still internet time. My employer uses a "netnanny" so there are many sites which one simply cannot access at work. This doesn't bother me greatly, as I don't need additional distractions. So, when I get home, I generally logon to two computers- one to play "Rail Nation" and the other for blogging, tweeting and everything else.
In essence, I guess I'm actually decompressing from my work e-framework by logging in to another network or two.
For those who are not constantly connected, this may seem to be quite the conundrum. However, even though I do not consider myself to be in the "continuously connected" category, I thy to keep my social media interactions in the "constantly interacted with" category. And this, I find, is my greatest challenge.
Five years. It's a good measure of time and goals...I think the Soviet Union was famous for these. So, going back 5 years...
The Soviet Union did not exist. I had a Facebook, Google, and Yahoo account. At some point, a Pinterest account was created. Apart from these, I have LinkedIn, Amazon, Newegg and "memberships" on a couple dozen other sites which I infrequently visit.
I'm most active these days on Twitter, then Facebook and finally LinkedIn. Now, this is not to say that I derive social media value from these services in the order in which they are presented; rather, I derive social media value where it exists.
For example, even though the vast majority of my internet social interaction may be generated on Twitter and reposted on Facebook, it does not mean that the main focus of my internet time is on Twitter. Like many folks, I shamelessly self promote- one has to in order to be heard above the static and background noise which is the Internet.
Every so often- generally once every month or so- I post a disclaimer on Twitter indicating that i am NOT a Data Scientist, related data professional , analyst or statistician, because, partly, I have a coworker who initially said, "You're a complete fraud!" To which I replied, "No, I'm completely honest.". He still says it, but mostly in jest these days, mostly because I've shown him comments, retweets and favorites of things I've tweeted or RT'ed. My "thing" is this: although I have no formal background, I have a serious amateur interest in stats, big data, analytics, tech, IoT, and STEM/STEAM, and am a huge proponent of them.
I also love the maker scene. Although I'm not hugely into it right now, our family has three Arduino Uno's, a pair of Raspberry Pi model B's, a couple of Linux (Ubuntu) PCs and lots of Legos, as well as an original Gilbert (pre-Meccano) Erector set, as well as one or two Meccano sets. Don't ask me how many PCs we have- I literally have no idea.
So, to close... I haven't done this in some time, but here are some previous posts you might enjoy. And, in keeping with the spirit of the5 year theme mentioned earlier- here is a selection of 5 older posts, which are currently #6 through #10 in all-time popularity. FWIW, this is post #185... I'm planning something special for #200, which may occur near Christmas (hopefully!)
I hope you are able to enjoy one or more of these. They're far from perfect, but they're honest, and I hope you have at least a bit of fun reading them- I really enjoy writing them!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
No comments:
Post a Comment