As I compile this week’s learnings, I am getting alerts on my phone of the score of the Red Sox / Yankees game in progress. As much of a Boston fan as I am, I didn’t even realize they were playing. Sadly sports hasn’t been anywhere near top of mine as it usually would be this time of year.

TMI – It’s somewhat strange getting the “making of the sausage” of my kiddos’ education in the form of alerts as to assignments and grades are posted by their teachers. One alert in particular had feedback from the teacher on the analysis of a short story Thing 1 read. As I had no idea what the story was about, and it was some form of very creative writing, it made for interesting dinner conversation to get the context of it all.

Podcasting 2.0 – Just when you though Joe Rogan’s deal with Spotify was the biggest news in the world of podcasting, recently Adam Curry, the co-creator of podcasting and Dave Jones, the creator of the Freedom Controller platform announced the Podcast Index. Its goal is a next-generation, open directory of all podcasts out there, open to any app or technology that wants to deliver podcasts to your ear. And fittingly, there’s a podcast for the project (its RSS feed link here) which I finally got a chance to listen to the first 2 episodes in the morning this week. There’s a lot of “making of the sausage” of podcasting along with the goals for this project. Though I don’t produce podcasts – yet – I consume them, and am looking forward to seeing this in action.

Oh, 2-1-3-4 – There’s such a thing as contact requests in Zoom, as I got my first one this week.

Let There Be Journalism – Dr. Vincent Filak is a professor of journalism who literally writes the book on it, and his textbook is a mainstay in many university programs. I know him through the guest lectures I have done where he teaches at the University of Wisconsin – Oshkosh, and in between the great philosophical chats we have I read his blog, Dynamics of Writing. This week he wrote about looking back on the “incident” with the Covington Catholic high school kids from a pure journalistic standpoint. I wish there was more of this type of reporting out there, as I might even re-subscribe to cable TV and newspapers again.

A Presidential Trek – John Burke, the president of Trek Bicycles, has written the Presidential Playbook 2020: 16 Nonpartisan Solutions to Save America. You can buy the book or get it for free in PDF format if you provide your email address. I did the latter, and though I haven’t read it completely I scanned the table of contents. His solutions, on the surface, are rather obvious, including “fix the health care system” and “reform campaign finance.” I am interested to find out, however, how he thinks progress can be made towards these.

Modern Proverb, By Me – She who controls their own Web hosting truly controls their Web destiny.

Cool Possible Trigger Warning – A contest is going on to nominate the Coolest Things Made in Wisconsin. Of course there are things related to cheese and the Packers, and there’s even one thing that’s NSFW. It’s also a great showcase of innovation here in America’s Dairyland.

A Smarter Way To Web – A wise person shared this article with me on how you can use heuristic analysis to increase Web site performance. For me personally, there wasn’t a lot I learned new from it. However it did reinforce my belief that a Web site is not a chicken spinning in a Popeil oven – you don’t just set it and forget it!

A Smarter Way to Learn – I participated in an intriguing Webinar on EduScrum, or how the Scrum framework is being applied in education. It was interesting to see how one particular school in the Netherlands had self-driven classrooms. The recording of the Webinar is not live yet, but it may be posted on this page where the concept of EduScrum is discussed.

2020 Has Been a Grind – Bruxism is the clinical term for teeth grinding. I know, as I suffer (is that the right word?) from it. This article talks about all the ways the pandemic has impacted people’s teeth, even if they didn’t contract the pesky virus.

More Good News – This weekly summary you are reading is not the only one coming out of the Fox River valley of Wisconsin. Insight Magazine’s editor Brian Rasmussen publishes Feel Good Friday weekly to those who subscribe to their newsletter. Insight is a local business magazine (yes, actually in print) that has kept me informed of all going on in my still relatively new home, and this weekly list is a nice addition to their reporting.

As the temperatures have dipped here in US upper Midwest, I found leaves on trees are already starting to change colors. I also found Words are Birds.

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

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