Something Must Be Wrong When "The One" Matters Too Much

Two recent incidents drove me to ask this question: How much should a leading individual matter for the fate of a cause?

Incident #1 is the death of Jack Layton, leader of Canada's NDP who ceased this week because of cancer. A great many Canadians are sad over the loss of this courageous fighter, who many thought was on his way to changing Canada. His final letter to Canadians messaged his hope and encouragements, but also almost marks the abortion of his ambitious cause. Here I sensed a bit of irony: If the death of an individual leader may have this big an impact on the political map of this country, Canada still has a long way to go before calling itself a model democracy. - Of course, I say this with full respect for the courage of this great fighter. May Jack Layton rest in peace.

Incident #2 may be drawing the attention of even more people: Steve Jobs quits his job. (If Apple fans all over the world collectively count as a country, it would out-populate Canada.) The finale of this great man has been this newest product "iQuit". Joking as it is, it is nothing but reasonable to believe the resignation of this charismatic CEO is impacting the perceptions of investors, employees and customers of Apple in a not-so-optimistic way. It puts into question whether or not Apple can stay equally cool, innovative, and competitive in the years to come. Again, the empire Steve Jobs co-founded and legendized is on its way to tasting the bitter consequence of himself being too charismatic and important.

My conclusion, if I have any, is that a dominantly strong leader (i.e. dictator?) is really a double-edged sword for the group. Running a cause on one of such super stars is dangerous. Being addicted to it is almost wrong. But unfortunately, like other addictions from alcohol to drugs, it's probably easier to acquire than to quit. Just one of the inevitable realities about human stupidity...

Welcome to "Cloud" Age

The other day I bumped into my classmate Michael in the subway after work. We had a quick random chat about each other's work before I jumped off the train. It was a few days after that I re-discovered Michael's business card that he handed to me that day. He must have passed it to me while we were talking, and I didn't even remember receiving it.

Well, I completely understand and appreciate his habit as a sales professional to pass a business card to his schoolmate in that context. He was also patient and passionate enough to give me a pitch about what his company does and his role in it. And I knew that he was doing so after ten hours' phone calls on his job.

But let's face this: who's still going to keep and read your business card today? If I want to get a hold of him, I'd most likely text him, Facebook him, or throw a quick email to his personal email, as opposed to his company email on the card. If I somehow need to know more about his company or job title, I'd most likely go to his Linkedin profile. All this can be done with a few clicks or, even quicker, by touching the screen on my Android phone.

Not without irony, the awesome product Michael talks about all day long with his great radio voice is basically a cloud-based database. Just like how Linkedin plays as an online storage of business cards, his company sells a system to empower businesses with enormous amount of data stored on line. This is the idea of cloud.

This week I started using a website called OhLife (ohlife.com). It sends you an email every evening asking how your day went. You can keep a personal journal by replying the email. I always enjoy writing as a way of self-reflection. To my pleasure, the interface of this website is simple and elegant enough to keep me interested.

One more free invention I just started embracing is dropbox, which gives you some virtual space that can synchronize files between Android phone and computer. Again, it is an example of how the invisible clouds change the way we do things.

I don't know where the "clouds" are taking us to. But one thing I know is business card is not the last thing to die from it.

Yuan Tengfei: Most Awesome History Teacher

The 38-year-old Beijing high school history teacher evoked public attention in late 2008, when his lecture videos were uploaded and spread on the internet. His humorous and sharp teaching style won him huge internet popularity and the title "Most Awesome History Teacher in History". In 2009 Mr. Yuan was invited as a speaker at Lecture Room (Bai Jia Jiang Tan) of CCTV, one of the most viewed TV shows in China, which features series of keynotes on Chinese history, literature and traditional culture. Prior to Yuan, this show had already popularized a few star scholars. Yuan's lectures 'Epic of the Song Dynasties' (Liang Song Feng Yun) renewed record audience ratings again with vividly told stories of history, with insightful research and interesting delivery. By the end of 2009, Yuan turned himself from an ordinary high school teacher to a well-known commentator, most welcomed speaker and best-selling author. No other high school teacher has gained as much sensation as he received in China, a country where liberal arts doesn’t gain much attention. "Calling me the Most Awesome Teacher, however, is a total exaggeration," Yuan himself responded humbly.

In early 2010 Yuan was involved into some political disputes. His comments about Mao, videotaped earlier as part of his class, was circulated on the internet and led to "punishment" by his school, though more of a gesture than real punishment, and some public pressure. This incident added to him another identity: a political dissident.

Beijing Workers' Singing Moved Millions

Two migrant workers in Beijing, with bare arms and worn faces, covered a song "In the Spring" (春天里) in their shabby dorm. This video quickly went popular among millions of viewers in China.

In the video are 29-year-old vagrant singer Liu Gang (the one with the guitar) and his friend, 44-year-old Wang Xu, who works as a docker in Beijing.

Wang Feng, original writer and performer of this song, highly praised their work as "lived out the true spirit of rock & roll from where it is most needed - the blue collar class". "I was most delighted to see my song re-produced by people like these two guys. They gave substantial meanings to my work and, more generally, all works of rock&roll as a means to express what needs to be said in our society."

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In the Spring -Lyrics

I still remember those spring days

When I hadn't cut off my long hair

I had no credit card and no girl

No home with 24-hour hot water supply

But I used to be that happy

Only with my old wooden guitar

In the street, under the bridge, and on the field

Singing the songs that nobody would listen to

If one day I'm old and alone

Please leave me back in those past days

If one day I'm gone silently

Please bury me in the spring

I still remember those spring days

Hardly had I grown beard

No present for Valentine's Day

Nor did I have my lovely princess

But I didn't think they were that bad days

Though I only had fantasies of love

In the dawn, in the night and in the breeze

Singing those songs that nobody would listen to

If one day I'm old and alone

Please leave me back in those past days

If one day I'm gone silently

Please bury me in the spring

Now you are my beautiful spring

As warm as it used to be

I cut my long hair and grew my beard

Pains are gone with the wind

But I feel such a sadness

Time left me deeper loss and emptiness

In the sunny spring days

My tears can't help shedding

...

Busyness Leads to Happiness

Here's a piece of recent work done by Christopher Hsee, of University of Chicago, a prominent researcher of psychology and one of those who established the term hedonomics.

http://www.psychologicalscience.org/index.php/publications/observer/obsonline/busyness-leads-to-happiness.html

It was three years ago when I was helping with some research on his team that Prof. Hsee told us about the original idea behind the article: he wanted to prove that people sometimes do things only to "release their excessive energy". Sounds like a strange idea, but he said he had a way to prove it (which is pretty much you read from the article above). I was soon convinced he's a genius.

Then we went to a few colleges to do the "experiments". I still remember some details: after finishing one survey, we "lied" to students that the questionnaires of next survey was not ready and they had 15 minutes to kill. They could either stay in the room or hand in the questionnaire to another location in the building where I was collecting the papers and sending out candies... At the end of the day, our data suggests that people would choose the farther location not for a better candy, but as an excuse to take a walk and avoid idling.

Now I'm really happy to see this very project is published, and realized that perhaps I should find myself some more "busyness" in order to be happier, rather than staying home all day long...

New Media Evolves Faster than Imaginable

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I was reading this book by David Kline and Dan Burstein on how blog was going to change the way the world interact. Three minutes after opening it, I said: "Wait a minute! This book was published in 2005, that is, when Facebook was an infant, Youtube was about to come out, and Twitter was nowhere. It's an astonishing fact to me that some of our integral interfaces DID NOT EXIST, only 5 years back. In other words, our planet was functioning without a large proportion of its veins, only 5 years back.

The Internet has been evolving so fast that nothing is predictable. -- This is my take on it.

My newest attention on Web2.0 revolves around the popularity of Sina's Weibo (Microblog), the Chinese equivalent of Twitter. Weibo has been a huge success and many (I wouldn't mind being included at all) say it brought a revolution to the way they process information. Barely 1 year since its launch, Weibo has a userbase of millions. This number is projected to reach 100 million in 2011!

Here's a summary of all the things that Weibo did differently from Twitter:

(1) Unlike Twitter (which only supports links), Weibo offers a wider range of features including attaching pictures to tweets (weibo's), commenting/sharing others' tweets, categorizing users being followed, etc.

(2) It promoted the product by inviting celebrities, who are often too busy to maintain a blog, but often have a few minutes to kill while waiting for a connecting flight. This has been a huge success!

(3) Event-based marketing was also emphasized. During FIFA World Cup 2010, such a big buzz was produced that 1,904,369 weibos (tweets) were generated on July 12th, with a record high of 3,619,063 total tweets (including re-tweeted) on the same day.

Here's an article with more on why and how Weibo plays the game differently: http://www.chinahourly.com/life/2317/

Better than penalties ?

These days I have been obsessed by the World Cup and home-cooked Chinese food.
Now the World Cup is having only the final 16 teams staying. What's next is going to be crueler: bloody eliminations. While we enjoy the breath-taking matches, someone came up with an interesting, peaceful and fairer way than penalty shoots, to decide the results when you have a draw: let victory go to the team who committed fewer fouls. Check it out for details: http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/lifestyle/patrick-barclay/penalties-spot

Will South Africa see any penalty-decider in the coming days? Let's see! ...