Figuring out who to listen to and what's right/wrong in the world of social media, podcasters, and experts of everything is difficult.

As a scientist and writer here's1 trick & 6 lessons on figuring out if a writer, podcaster, or expert should be listened to or not. 👇👇👇

In regards to the #CapitolCoup, I’m in a unique position. I monitored forums ahead of time and then was present for the coup itself.

These are my observations based on what I saw and the evidence that’s been collected so far. I reserve the right to adjust my analysis as needed.

Let’s talk about the organization of the coup first. Seeing some people insist that the coup must have been highly planned and coordinated.

Yes and no. This was a #StochasticCoup. We’ll see little evidence of direct communication between Trump and the insurrectionists.

Within the insurrectionists, there was not one group that executed the storming of the Capitol.

Rather, there were a number of smaller groups working independently towards the same goal. I expect you’ll see little evidence that these various groups communicated with each other.

What you will see is detailed planning and coordination within these small groups.

Then there were the joyriders, those Trump supporters who weren’t directly involved in any plotting but who were more than happy to go along for the ride once the coup was in motion.

After four years, the insurrectionists were carefully attuned to Trump’s messaging.

Every tweet and statement of his was treated as marching orders and carefully dissected for meaning.

It’s why shutting down Trump’s Twitter account was so important.

The 2020s will be known as the Remote Work decade

A few predictions of what is likely to emerge

[ a thread ] 💻🏠🌍

🏦Third Space: Office and Working from Home will be joined by somewhere close by that a number of people will use

Supermarkets or local bank branches should emerge as a convenient ubiquitous location option – if they are smart

⏰Asynchronous Work: Offices are instantaneous gratification distraction factories where synchronous work makes it impossible to get stuff done

Tools that enable asynchronous work are the most important thing globally remote teams need. A lot of startups will try to tackle this

⚽️Hobbie Renaissance: Remote working will lead to a rise in people participating in hobbies and activities which link them to people in their local community

This will lead to deeper, more meaningful relationships which overcome societal issues of loneliness and issolation

🚜Rural Living: World-class people will move to smaller cities, have a lower cost of living & higher quality of life

These regions must innovate quickly to attract that wealth. Better schools, faster internet connections are a must

The 2018 State of JavaScript survey is out. They got 20,000 responses and have some delicious, delicious data. I'mma thread in some highlights:

First up: JavaScript flavors. There's TypeScript at 47% adoption, a tad higher than npm's own survey results (which said 46%). npm's survey is coming up again soon and will ask about TypeScript in a lot more detail.

I really, *really* like SoJ's "would not use again" question, which lets people who've abandoned a tech self-identify. This is noticeable in the graph above with Flow users -- 41% of people who've used Flow say they wouldn't use it again.

Now JavaScript frameworks. It's been a full year since npm's survey, so these numbers differ from ours in the directions I expected:
React 65% (vs. 60%)
Vue 29% (vs. 24%)
Ember 5% (vs 4%, I was expecting a bigger rise)

But there's a shocker in here: Angular.

npm's survey had Angular at 40% last year and SoJ has it at either:
- 58% (if you include those who don't want to use it again)
- 24% (if you count only those who like it)
Since npm's question didn't ask if they intend to *continue* using it I think that might explain this.

'Tera mera rishta kya, hindu, hindu,hindutva' is a clear take on 'tera mera rishta kya,la ilaha illallah'. As much as Hindutva hates the monotheistic religions especially Islam, there's a strange wistfulness and subliminal need at display now, to BE that they hate. 1

Charlie Hebdo doesn’t come up as a cautionary tale now but rather 'why cant we be like that'?
Growing up, Hanuman was an adorable deity for us, who swallowed the sun, or who couldn’t figure out what was Sanjeevani booti so he picked up a whole mountain and came back with it. 2

Or he was loyal, admirable and when he cleaved his chest, you saw both Ram and Sita. Now we have a lot of “Angry Hanuman” stickers. Why is a cute childlike God angry? We don’t know. It's a convenient blank space where to paint all the angst of Hindu Khatre mein hain narrative. 3

The other strange thing that has started happening is pictures of Ram appearing sans Sita. “Jai Siya Ram” has become “Jai Shri Ram”. Some people disingenuously explain it as being the same thing - because Shri is a name of Lakshmi. Not really. Siya is an apbhransh of Sita. 4

Shri is a prefix of respect in this case. Hinduism is being militarised. A woman/Sita has no place in it. Even the militaristic Goddess that is Durga has no place in this conception of neo-Hindu divinity, as evidenced by Dilip Mandal wondering where Durga came from. 5