For years I was familiar with what I remember as the “battle” of Dunkirk. Memories recall a battle and evacuation from the French city during World War II. To be completely honest, the main reason why I remember this at all is because I was born in Dunkirk, New York, which gets its name from the French city. An opportunity to truly learn what happened then and there would complete this connection.

Receiving the book Dunkirk: The History Behind the Major Motion Picture as a gift was very much welcome. A few pages into it I quickly learned this was not a book based on the movie, rather the story of what happened in Dunkirk, France in 1940 that was the basis for the movie. The author, Joshua Levine, was a historical advisor to the movie Dunkirk which was written and directed by Christopher Nolan and came out in 2017.

As you might guess, this book widened my eyes to the real story of what happened in Dunkirk and other related fronts of the war in Europe. Featured were many stories of what really was a rescue of thousands of British and some French troops from the beaches of Dunkirk. Where greater context of the overall state of the war was presented, the focus of this book – as well as the movie – is what happened on the ground in and around Dunkirk.

Where there are many lessons to be learned in wartime, I had a few specific takeaways from this book and the story it told.

Last Chance at First-Hand Accounts – The book was written about 5 years ago, just before 80th anniversary of the rescue at Dunkirk. Fortunately there were still some surviving soldiers and participants in the rescue effort alive who were able to tell their story. This added greatly to the stark reality of the war and the enormity of the rescue effort.

Newly Invented Degaussing Aided The Rescue – Degaussing is the process of removing a magnetic field, and is often referred to as demagnetizing or wiping. It was a relatively new process that came out of research during World War II, and played a great role in the rescue. Hundreds of ships were degaussed in order to reduce the chance of magnetic mines being drawn to them and blowing them up.

The Term “Dunkirk Spirit” Is Still Used Today – The term Dunkirk Spirit came from the effort of many to rally around the cause of rescuing the soldiers from the shores of the French city. I occasionally see the phrase in use today in reference to any collective of people rallying around a cause. It’s good to see that even today some good comes from the tragedy of war that led to the need for the rescue.

Dunkirk is a very well-written and engaging story on the rescue. At some points it is hard to follow all of the soldiers and military leaders, but I tried not to focus on individuals instead on the monstrous rescue effort. The book concludes with backstory on the production of the movie itself, from Nolan’s script and creation of characters and the challenges of recreating the rescue scenes. With an eye towards authenticity over computer-generated imagery, the level of effort to recreate some scenes was near equal to was done during the rescue itself. One such example was to create a “pier” out of military vehicles, which included sinking them into the water so soldiers could pass over them.

If you enjoy history or simply like stories of overcoming the odds, I highly recommend Dunkirk: The History Behind the Major Motion Picture. As I pass along all books I read, this one goes to my Father-in-law, a military veteran himself, who also enjoys such stories.

---

This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

---

Did you enjoy this? Subscribe to The Hot Iron by RSS/XML feed or Read by Email

Book Take-Aways • (0) Comments • Permalink

Business, tech and sports made the list this week, but it was far from bland.

Be a Certified Mentor – The University of Wisconsin Green Bay (yes, that Green Bay, and for those outside of Wisconsin, there’s a lot more there than football!) is offering a virtual certificate in mentorship program. Over the years I have unofficially served in this role, namely as people have told me they consider me a mentor, something I was always proud to hear. This university certificate will take me through a formal process of being a mentor, and I am looking forward to taking it.

Ducking Email – A new message appeared on my DuckDuckGo home page in my browser (yes, DuckDuckGo is search engine of choice) promoting a new email protection service they are offering. It looks like you get an email address something like .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), and you can use it to filter your own email thru their servers, where it will remove tracking, ads, etc. I signed up for the beta of this free service, though I doubt I can get .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), but that would be a cool email address nonetheless as I experiment with this service.

Tom the Troll – Being the GOAT has its privileges. Twice this week I saw signs of Tom Brady being Tom Brady, no matter who is around him, even the President of the United States at his own house. First the Tampa Bay Buccaneers football team visited the White House after winning the Super Bowl over the winter. In his remarks at the 18 minute mark of this video from C-SPAN the 21-season quarterback cracked jokes about President Biden’s election victory and nickname from the former president. He then appeared in a commercial for the revamp of Subway sub shops’s menu even though he likely won’t eat there.

Getting Back in the Saddle On Stage – I caught the live broadcast of “So What?” a videocast by Trust Insights on the topic of returning to live presentations at events after over a year of webinar after webinar after webinar after... well you get the point. My good friend John Wall, who is as much of a marketing genius as he is a marketing realist, talked about his recent in-person conference with his colleagues among other marketing insights.

Get Out of My Building! – First Amazon wanted access to your car trunk to deliver packages, now they want access to your apartment building. Amazon Key for Business is going a little too far for me, but for others it may be just what they want.

Google Says Now Do This – Just when you thought owning a Web site was enough work, the search behemoth Google has rolled out Core Web Vitals. What is this? They are now saying page performance measurements will be taken into consideration with page ranking in search results. For example if your Web site has ginormous images and loads slow, you will rank lower. Note Core Web Vitals is a subset of Web Vitals, which contains more requirements. Talk to your Web consultant about this, and if you don’t have one – get one!

Go Bucks! – Congrats to the Milwaukee Bucks basketball team for winning the NBA Championships, their first in 50 years. Where I admit I don’t follow the sport that was invented about 5 miles from where I grew up as much as I used to, being in-state it’s hard to miss the coverage, namely of their exciting star Giannis Antetokounmpo. It was nice to see Bucks players from my childhood, namely Kareen Abdul-Jabbar and Oscar Robertson, at the games.

Even Tom Hanks Can't Sell Me on This One – The Cleveland Indians baseball team is rebranding as the Cleveland Guardians. From the response I heard, the expression “meh” seemed universal. It will certainly drive sales of new merchandise, but will it bring back a World Series to the city on Lake Erie? Apparently Hanks’s tie to Cleveland goes to when he was starting out in his acting career.

A Different Take on BOGO – In what people call a tight real estate (or any) market, salespeople need to do what they can to stand out. Even if it means free animals, I guess? I saw this car when stopped at a light this past week and was so shocked I almost didn’t get the picture. Interestingly it was at the same intersection I got this picture of a few weeks ago of Jack. Let’s see what else this magic crossroad yields in the future.

Let the games begin!

---

This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

---

Did you enjoy this? Subscribe to The Hot Iron by RSS/XML feed or Read by Email

What I Learned • (0) Comments • Permalink

Despite my local gas station recently upgrading its pumps with video screens and blasting GSTV – Gas Station TV for those who fortunately have never heard of it – nothing below came from what I was sucked into viewing for the brief periods of refueling the minivan over the past few weeks.

Swim Spox – As I have eluded to in the past (which some say too often), every year my kiddos swim team puts on 2 major swim meets in the summer. Well, except for last year. We were allowed to host them again this year (with a mere 8 weeks to pull them off, but I digress). As these meets means a lot to swimmers and the community, I had the honor to once again be interviewed by a local radio program, Fresh Take on WHBY, and its host Josh Dukelow. You can hear the segment on the WHBY Web site at the 38-minute time code. It’s been a while since I have done an interview like this, and listening to it I thought it turned out well.

To Books and Beyond – Speaking of the community, a little pat on the back to myself as I was chosen to be on the Library Building Project Advisory Committee for the reimagining of the Appleton, Wisconsin Public Library. I applied for this volunteer role and was selected after a call from the city’s mayor. We had our first meeting this past week virtually and I am looking forward to sharing my thoughts and meeting my fellow community members as the city moves towards a new library.

Twenty Years of That’s Weird, Grandma – For a couple of years I had the honor to be on the Board of Barrel of Monkeys, an arts-education organization in Chicago who teaches inner-city school kids creative writing, then takes what the kids writes and adapts sketch comedy from them. It really is as awesome as it sounds. On August 5 there will be the celebration of the 20th anniversary of That’s Weird, Grandma, the show that PlayMakers Laboratory (their recently rebranded organizational name) puts on to showcase this comedy. It will be held in person at The Annoyance Theater in Chicago as well as streamed online. Tickets and making a donation is available here. Where That’s Weird, Grandma is best seen in person, seeing it online with a live audience will be equally awesome.

Master Change – Where we all know a change will do you good, many people don’t make that change. Specifically for small businesses, this can be to their detriment. Barry Moltz is a small business consultant and someone whom I worked with years ago for my past business. He has written several great books on small business and his newest one, ChangeMasters, is coming out this fall. Though I am not in my own business anymore I have pre-ordered a copy as I know there will be much in there I can lean on for my own job. You can sign up to receive free chapters from ChangeMasters once they are available.

Make My Favorite Meme – I don’t always make memes, but when I do it’s either with the Dos Equis beer guy or the Change My Mind scene – where podcaster/comedian Steven Crowder is sitting at a table, sipping coffee, with a sign that has a statement and closes with, Change My Mind. I found this site where I can create my own Change My Mind memes, and you can too.

What’s In a Name? – PBC is a horrible auto-immune liver disease that primarily inflicts women, and I lost my Mom to it many years ago. The acronym used to stand for Primary Biliary Cirrhosis, but new to me is that it was renamed to Primary Biliary Cholangitis several years ago. Why? Apparently the Cirrhosis part only happens late in the process of having the overall disease. Plus, Cirrhosis has a very negative connotation with drug or alcohol abuse, which for someone with PBC may never come into play. I can attest to that, as that came up every time someone asked and I had to explain it. Also new to me is this cartoon video that came out a few years ago where a piano-playing liver named Liverace describes what PBC is. It’s a long 4+ minute video, and still need to show it to my kiddos, but I am interested in hearing anyone’s thoughts on this one. Especially as I am not sure this is the best way to talk about something so deadly.

Fighting Fish Fallout – A headline came and went across my bow a few weeks ago that Subway sub shops weren’t serving real tuna fish, and whatever the substance was didn’t have any tuna DNA in it. Honestly I didn’t put a whole lot of thought into it, although the idea of DNA testing it seemed odd to me. Apparently this wasn’t exactly a true story, and the global sub franchise giant has come out with this Web site to combat the fake news on their tuna. I thought this was a well-done, straightforward site detailing the case at hand, the falsehoods and offered the names of their tuna suppliers. Why stories come out like this is baffling to me, but sadly not that surprising. As many Subway sub shops are owned by entrepreneurs, I wish them well.

Go HOMAGO! – When I was on the first Library Building Project Advisory Committee meeting this past week, I learned the acronym HOMAGO, which stands for Hang Out, Mess Around, Geek Out. It is used by the YOUmedia learning labs that are part of the Chicago Public Library system. Where I was familiar with the labs, I wasn’t with the acronym. It harkens back to my days growing up with LEGOs and my TRS-80 computer.

Taking Suck to a Whole New Level – The other day I visited the local Tropical Smoothie Café for lunch, and noticed a couple of summer flavors that came with a lime straw. The staff mentioned it is indeed edible and lasts about 40 minutes. What the heck, so I tried it and saved the straw wrapper to look up what it’s made of. Its brand name is Sorbos, and after looking at the ingredients, I’ll stick with plastic or paper, or heck, just remove the lid and slurp. I’m not even including a link to these things. It’s a bad way to try to add the taste of lime to a drink.

His Beat Was What I Needed – I learned that hip-hop artist Biz Markie died this past week. He was known for the song “Just a Friend” that came out in 1989 and was a favorite on the R&B shows on my college radio station. I saw him perform at SUNY-Albany in 1990 in an on-campus concert series where the Red Hot Chili Peppers also performed. Biz Markie was the last performer, and as we left the venue we saw him come down the steps near us and hopped thru the open window in the back of a station wagon, something to this day I clearly have never forgotten.

Of Course – As I mentioned a few months ago, I have been working out of a great co-working spot in the downtown of my fair city, and as a result I have noticed architectural gems I never did before. Another one is the above-pictured horse’s head atop a building that now hosts a tea bar and a law office. Was it a stable at one point? Not sure, but I am sure it was put there for a reason.

"Privacy isn’t something I’m merely entitled to, it’s an absolute prerequisite.” – Marlon Brando

---

This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

---

Did you enjoy this? Subscribe to The Hot Iron by RSS/XML feed or Read by Email

What I Learned • (0) Comments • Permalink

It was a short week workwise, and though I was wicked busy, I seemed to be more on auto-pilot than anything. Looking back, about the only real thinking I did was whether or not I wanted to get the early child tax credits the US government for some reason is handing out this year ahead of next year’s taxes.

Do and Deduct Accessibility – Speaking of taxes, here’s a tax credit for small businesses that makes sense. US tax code says you can deduct some expenses to make your business accessible. Though it doesn’t explicitly state you can deduct Web or digital Accessibility, why not? A great question for a CPA or tax advisor as I am neither of them.

Camp and De-Google – For the last several years I have been using Matomo on this very blog. Matomo is a free, open-source alternative to Google Analytics. Though I work with Google Analytics, or GA for short, as part of my job, for myself the less Big Tech I am involved with the better. So I have been experimenting with Matomo along with GA, which I still have here as well. With that long setup, there’s plans for a MatomoCamp in the making. A “camp” is really an informal conference, and this would be for people to learn about and expand their knowledge of Matomo. It looks like there’s a ways to go in planning, but it will be interesting to see how people are using it, especially as I am the only one I know who does.

Elton Encore – Tickets went on sale this past week for Sir Elton John’s farewell tour when it hits the home of my New England Patriots next year on my birthday. While seeing this performance would be a treat, it wouldn’t be the first time I saw him in concert at Gillette Stadium, and up close too. Back in 2004 I was at the season opener of the Patriots as they celebrated another Super Bowl championship. I took the train to the game and it arrived later than planned. As I was running through the concourse to my seats, I came head-on to security clearing a path for a golf cart, and on it was none other than Elton himself, complete with a scared look on his face! Moments later Elton John performed with the Boston Pops, as you can see in this YouTube video. That experience would be hard to top.

Good While It Lasted – Amazon announced it is ending its 2% reward when you load at least $100 into your account with the Big Tech retail giant. You have until the day before my birthday to take advantage of this gain, which has a better return than most bank savings accounts offer. Clearly this means Amazon worked out a better deal on credit card processing, which I presume is why they offered this alternative in the first place. You can still load manually or automatically to your account, and if you do the latter they will give you $5 for the first time you do it.

Make Your Own Final Countdown – In recent years I have warmed back up to countdown clocks on Web sites. Perhaps it is because there is one on the swim meet Web site I manage? I have also seen such clocks in email messages and wondered how those were done. This past week I finally looked into it, and this post explains the why and how to make your own countdown clock for email and Web too.

Keep ‘Em Separated Or Else – I have always been a firm believer in the separation of personal and work email. My reasons have been mainly for organizational purposes, but also because your work email belongs to your employer, so why use it for personal use? A group called the Wisconsin Transparency Project wants to make this law, making it illegal to use private email for public business. Their argument, beyond organizational purposes, is that it adds complexity when open record requests are made for emails for a person, and their personal accounts have to be scoured as well as work accounts. Though I am not someone who advocates for legislating common sense, I can get behind this one.

Train Keeps A Rollin’ – A consistent commercial during the 1970’s was for Wausau Insurance. Here’s an example of one, which features the train station in the north central Wisconsin city where the insurance company was based, that was animated in the outro of all of their commercials. As the spot said, the trains aren’t running anymore, and haven’t ran past this station in decades. Heck, the company was acquired by Liberty Mutual Insurance and is no more. This past weekend I went there and took the above photo, as the for the past few years the station has been home to Timekeeper Distillery. I also went in and sampled their tasty spirits, taking home a bottle of their Straight Bourbon Whiskey. This will be a new auto stop for me when driving “Up North.”

Happy US Independence Day!

---

This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

---

Did you enjoy this? Subscribe to The Hot Iron by RSS/XML feed or Read by Email

What I Learned • (0) Comments • Permalink

One could assume I am merely getting into a groove of writing my learnings every 2 weeks, but people who know me would know better. Trying to compress 8 months of planning and prep for an outdoor swim meet into 4 weeks played into this a little bit. Ok, a lot. But it was worth it, and worth sitting down to compile this list is as well.

See The Fruits of My Labors – A lot of hard work went into putting that swim meet together by a lot of people, including new elements required as a result of city mandates which I presume are to prevent the meet from turning into a super-spreader event? One of those elements was livestreaming the meet. Where it has become commonplace for swim meets around the country, we haven’t done it ourselves, and at an outdoor pool to boot. We pulled it off, and if you’re inclined you can see it on the Fox Cities Bird Bath swim meet’s YouTube channel. Believe it or not the view and angles of the pool are very helpful to swim families.

My Morning Brew Means More – Go ahead and accuse me of picking and choosing scientific studies, but I am all over this one on how coffee consumption helps prevent chronic liver disease.

More Reasons Not to Put It On a Hot Dog – After reading this list of rather handy uses for ketchup other than eating it you likely won’t want eat it either. My guess is my new favorite ketchup by TrueMadeFoods I mentioned a few weeks back doesn’t have the same side uses.

So Long Sweet Baby Ray – Larry Raymond, the founder and namesake of the Sweet Baby Ray’s barbeque sauce, died at the end of May. Raymond was from Chicago where he was a chef and started the sauce brand over an illustrious career. He later lived in my wife’s hometown here in Wisconsin. His sauce lives on as it is now owned by the same Massachusetts company that makes Ken’s Steak House salad dressings.

Although I have known it for years, I am repeatedly reminded that being a leader comes from action, not from a title.

Accessibility Wins In Bill Loss – Where news coverage portrayed the only people against U.S. Senate Bill 1, or S1, were Republicans, those who are seeking greater accessibility in voting were as well. Why? The For The People Act had a paper ballot mandate, which goes against already existing technology to aid those with impairments to vote beyond a paper ballot. This statement from the National Coalition for Accessible Voting details some of the opposition that goes beyond party lines.

Tallying Recounts with Existing Technology – Where I have seen a lot of coverage on the recounting of 2020 election ballots in Arizona, what I haven’t seen much coverage on is an easier way to audit the vote. This way was proposed by a trio including Larry Moore, who I had the privilege to work for in the past and has helmed 2 digital voting firms. Perhaps it’s the lack of sensationalism that explains why the coverage is so sparse?

Looking Google In The Eye With Your Web Site – People often lament to me the challenges they have with their Web site’s ranking in Google. Perhaps these straightforward missives from digital marketing guru Chris Abraham will help with tips on what work you should be doing on your Web site for Google to notice and this 3-part series on how to deal with the Big Tech firm’s latest algorithm changes.

Then There’s What You Have to do in Ontario – Larger firms in the Canadian province of Ontario also have to ensure their Web site meets accessibility standards. They have to do so not because it’s a great idea, but because it’s the law. And they can get fined for not meeting those accessibility standards.

Bene There, Done Them – A staple of early Web sites in the 90’s were small, rectangular animated icons promoting other Web sites or technology. I recall making some myself and adding others to various Web sites. If you don’t know what I am talking about see for yourself – this site has literally thousands of these 88 by 31 pixel icons.

Maybe I Should Start Everything Like This – I came across this video of a classical singer warming up for a performance with a true classic, the theme to Star Trek: The Original Series. I need to take a timeout and think about how I can break the monotony of the daily grind and infuse a little “wow” into it.

Bridging the Virtual Gap – When I took the training from Mike Cohn of Mountain Goat Software to become a Certified Scrum Product Owner the takeaways from the course were the materials and experience that made it well worth it. The cherry on the sundae was the gift box they sent me afterwards, which I just opened the other week. I commented on the branding of their materials and Web site, but this gift blew me away! Pictured above, there’s a custom designed box complete with goat pictures inside and out. Inside was a hand-written note from Mike, a notebook and a deck of Planning Poker cards, used for planning in Scrum. For fun there was a pen with a USB Flash drive built-in, stickers and temporary tattoos. This was a treat and excellent way for the virtual course to come 360 with something tangible.

---

This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

---

Did you enjoy this? Subscribe to The Hot Iron by RSS/XML feed or Read by Email

What I Learned • (2) Comments • Permalink