With so many hateful, intolerant so-called Christians in the news … on this day we should be reminded of the real message of Christ.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube. #LIGHTtheWORLD
Category: good news
It’s better to give than to receive. :-)
Give back and light the world this Christmas season. #LightTheWorld
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube. Wonderful idea.
the future of the NEWS
What will the most popular news sources of the future look like?
I’m hopeful for the soon to be launched Wikitribune.
Evidence-based journalism
People today mostly get their news from TV (not bad) and social media (terrible).
My favourite news source right now is Axios, just 6 months old.
Smart brevity.
Axios covers 7 areas: politics, tech, media trends, health, science, energy, and future of work (AI, robotics, etc.).
They want to deliver the cleanest, smartest, most efficient and trust-worthy experience for readers and advertisers alike.
It was founded by Mike Allen, former chief political reporter for Politico. I like Politico too, founded in 2007. And Jim VandeHei.
John F. Harris and Jim VandeHei left The Washington Post to become The Politico‘s editor-in-chief and executive editor, respectively.
So … Washington Post begat Politico begat Axios.
If interested, start by signing up for any of the Axios email newsletters.
mapping the world in a simpler way
What3words (stylizedwhat3words) is a geocoding system for the simple communication of locations with a resolution of 3 m.
what3words encodes geographic coordinates into 3 dictionary words (for example, the Statue of Liberty is located at planet.inches.most).
Click PLAY or see how it works on Vimeo.
Mongolia officially adopted the new address system. Click PLAY or watch it on Vimeo.
best refugee housing
Let’s say you have to flee your country.
Where would you go?
You’d cross the border hoping to return to your home, family and friends as soon as possible.
To a clean, safe refugee camp.
Former soldier and UN observer Neale Sutton and businessman Andrew Hamilton’s self-designed “Humanihut” was last week plucked from relative obscurity to be on the Disrupt 100 list, an index of the most promising start-ups around the world. …
After securing a $50,000 grant from the South Australian government, the pair then engaged Adelaide company Applidyne to create “proof of concept” drawings based on their specifications.
The final product is a robust family-sized hut that can be set up in five minutes, with a village of 2400 huts designed to be set up in three days, inclusive of power, water and sewage. Their calculations show that one shipping container can hold 16 Humanihuts.
“When you unpack the 16 huts, the shipping container is then reconfigured to be the shower, washing and cleaning facilities for those people living in those 16 huts. We bring our own water treatment plant that can reuse 85 per cent of the “black water” for showers and toilets,” said Sutton. …
South Australian entrepreneurs seek to improve refugee lives with Humanihut
Click PLAY or watch it on Facebook.
The Humanihut Shelter System is an inexpensive, innovative and robust shelter system for people at their time of greatest need.
Thanks Mary.
harvesting clean water from fog
Clean water is the world’s immediate need. Education of girls and women the long term priority.
Click PLAY or watch it on Facebook.
The research paper.
via Hashem Al-Ghaili
2015: The Best Year in History for the Average Human Being
As Bill Gates keeps telling us, the World is actually getting better. Overall. 🙂
6.7 million fewer kids under the age of five are dying each year compared to 1990.
2015: The Best Year in History for the Average Human Being
Click through to read the long article by Charles Kenney in The Atlantic.
Google’s Project Soli – Minority Report is nearly here
Rockin‘ linked to a post called …
GOOGLE’S NEW PROJECT SOLI IS MIND BLOWING – SEE IT IN ACTION
We’re very close to having the technology seen in Minority Report. (2002)
Project Soli is developing a new interaction sensor using radar technology. The sensor can track sub-millimeter motions at high speed and accuracy. It fits onto a chip, can be produced at scale and built into small devices and everyday objects.
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
Jeb Bush, Bobby Jindal, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, Rick Perry? Do you hate Gays?
The issue of Gay marriage is actually not very important to me. (Marriage is not important to me.)
But I do like to watch bigoted Tea Party types squirm. Love to see racists called out. Love it when regular voters want to ask Ted Cruz – “Do you hate Gays?” 🙂
Gallup polling confirms that the number of Americans who believe homosexuality is “morally acceptable” is at an all-time high at just under 60 percent, up from around 40 in the early 2000s. This support is even more pronounced among millennials.
Mike Pence just lobbed a grenade into the Republican presidential field.
The Indiana governor’s religious freedom law has ignited yet another controversial culture war debate that has Republican contenders juggling awkward questions about issues they would just as soon not touch.
This time around, the policy issue isn’t same-sex marriage — it’s about nondiscrimination laws and whether they should accompany Religious Freedom Restoration Acts like the one just passed in Indiana.
But regardless, Republicans are getting pummeled over gay rights issues of all sorts — and face the familiar dilemma of whether a conservative stance that makes for good politics in a GOP primary will hurt them in a general election. …
It will hurt the GOP long term. This is a losing issue. Jeb Bush, at least, should have backtracked already.
Utah reduced homelessness by 72%
If you’ve traveled around the States, you know that homelessness is conspicuous in the richest nation of the World.
That’s always surprised me.
But Utah’s turned that around in a surprising way.
Republican State Gives Free Houses to Moochers, Cuts Homelessness by 74 Percent
The state is giving homeless people homes. It’s a solution that might sound too simple, but it’s working. The program, called “Housing First”, has origins in New York. Utah started its own pilot of the program in 2005 with 17 people. The state took them off the street and put them into housing for twenty-two months. After the state saw that all 17 people remained housed and stable during that time, the project was expanded. …
Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=tyQcXfslc6c
VIDEO: Utah Gives Homes To The Homeless As Arctic Temperatures Bring Suffering
Housing First, which is distinct and separate from “rapid re-housing”, is a relatively recent innovation in human service programs and social policy regarding treatment of the homeless and is an alternative to a system of emergency shelter/transitional housing progressions.
Rather than moving homeless individuals through different “levels” of housing, known as the Continuum of Care, whereby each level moves them closer to “independent housing” (for example: from the streets to a public shelter, and from a public shelter to a transitional housing program, and from there to their own apartment in the community) Housing First moves the homeless individual or household immediately from the streets or homeless shelters into their own apartments.
Housing First approaches are based on the concept that a homeless individual or household’s first and primary need is to obtain stable housing, and that other issues that may affect the household can and should be addressed once housing is obtained. …
Thanks Dean.
Rick McCharles 