Geek Stuff category archive

Susan A. Nolan and Michael Kimball, writing at Psychology Today Blogs, look at the traits and tendencies that make some persons liable to take the bait in phishing schemes. You might want to follow the link and see if it reminds you of anyone you are know.

On a related subject, we have almost completely stopped getting those phony car warranty telephone calls. They haven’t stopped trying, though. They’re now using the mail. I got one of their phony letters just the other day.

(Broken tag fixed.)

Many years ago, I tried out for a tech support job where my potential employers had built “multitasking” into the job description. One was expected to deal with phone calls, emails, and chats simultaneously. It was a great experience, but I ended up not making it through the training period.

Now comes Peg Streep at Psychology Today Blogs to explain that multitasking is a myth (emphasis added); follow the link for the complete piece.

Yes, the very organ that sets us apart from all the other creatures, and it is truly fabulous in myriad ways. But it does have its limits and those limits come into play when we try to multitask. The brain’s huffing and puffing in these moments makes us think we’re getting more done but, in Marci’s words: “When we multitask, we don’t get more done. We just expend more effort and strain areas of our brain.” The area of the brain in question is the prefrontal cortex, the command center of executive function, and multitasking just creates bottlenecks, disrupting communication between the parts of the brain as neuroimaging makes clear. But our thought processes collude and, because multitasking feels like more work, we’re likely to believe that, like a physical workout, feeling the strain is a good thing and that we’re being more productive. Nope.

Aside:

The rock that sank my boat had nothing to do with my technical or people skills. Rather, this company placed great emphasis on telling callers and chatters when you would get back the them. I wasn’t able to get that down.

Driving away from that office for the last time was one of the two times in my life I have felt as if a physical weight were being lifted from my shoulders.

We are doomed.

At Psychology Today Blogs, Phil Reed discusses several recent studies that indicate that “social” media isn’t. He makes three main points.

• Several recent studies have shown that high levels of social media use can negatively impact physical health.
• Evidence suggests that social media can damage psychological welfare and physical functioning if its use is taken too far.
• In one study, the group asked to reduce their social media use had an average 15 percent improvement in immune function.

Follow the link for a detailed discussion of each.

Then try w3m.

As far as I am concerned, it is easily the best text web browser.

It should be in your repos.

Oh, yeah.

You can’t do this on Windows. And probably not on Macs (I have no way of testing that, and don’t want one).

Pay to play Cash-grab frolics.

Aside:

I wonder just how many persons will be willing to pay the Zuckerborg for the privilege of being assimilated?