This Slogging thread by Ellen, Linh, Hang, and Beni occurred in HackerNoon's official #general channel and has been edited for readability. Look, I may be a little biased, but I think has one of the best selections of humans working for them in the whole world (literally, we're remote). HackerNoon I knew that there was something genuinely special about this platform and group of people. It felt strangely like joining a friend group that I had been a part of since I was little. on my first day I continue to feel like everyone on the team -- and actually a lot of the people who interact with the platform -- are like unique versions of me. I'm not sure I've ever felt this way so significantly,  and I've worked with awesome people in the past. Anyhow, part of working with really cool people and trying fascinating new concepts for ideas,  is that sometimes taking things from concept to execution (which by the way is incredible to have the opportunity to do) requires quite the intense hustle on the part of different departments on the team. We had decided to announce the winners for both of the and -first time ever- campaign, on the same day, (for Valentine's Day), and we pulled through! Noonies Startups What that entailed behind the scenes was notable. We had to create a system for both of the award platforms which would generate individual winner awards and award links, we needed to have a design that worked with the systems, we also needed to make sure the copy for all of the blogs and emails was ready to go, all while quoting and linking the correct materials. Furthermore, we needed to make sure to test and deliver all of this on time. On top of this, we have an exciting new option on regarding , which we had to create for thousands of winners. Thank you to our star dev Marcos for writing the script to make that happen. HackerNoon tech pages There will be a further Slogging draft about what went into delivering those projects, but the bottom line is we did it!!! (the quirky way I like to refer to myself--  check it, ) likes to acknowledge when people do good work! ellenBrain I have my own tag Thank you to everyone on the team, as well as to everyone who participated in the campaigns in one way or another!!! I look forward to everything we will be able to share together in 2022 and beyond! Below is Ellen deciding to give everyone on the team a props. As she does. Ellen Feb 14, 2022, 10:13 PM Um, y’alll, yaaaaaalll, I’m stoked and super proud. I think it’s incredible what we did today. We closed two major campaigns in one day, ON TIME, and created individually crafted awards for almost 5K people. ( Plus the tech pages - yes I see you Marcos! David has been wanting those to happen forever!!) That’s incredible y’all. Y’all, I can’t. We likely made so many people’s day better today. What a way to show up and deliver. BAM.  Happy Valentine’s Day ❤  Thank you to all of the excellent humans who made this possible. What a team effort! Next level y’all. Absolutely stunned <3  For those of you who have lives outside of work, I hope you take a minute to yourself to enjoy, have some bubbly, do whatever it is you like. For everyone else, see you on Slack, we did it! So BOSS y’all! :dino: 7 ❤ 7 :fast_parrot: 8 💚 8 :fireball: 8 :brain: 7 💰 6 ✅ 1 Linh Feb 14, 2022, 10:30 PM Lol for those who have lives outside of work apparently not applicable to me Utsav Jaiswal or Hang :savage-joy: 💚 1 Linh Feb 14, 2022, 10:31 PM (I think Beni might join the club too I saw his cypress messages on Saturday night :savage-joy: ) 💚 1 Hang Feb 14, 2022, 10:31 PM Linh you don’t call me out like that :dead-inside: :savage-joy: 2 Linh Feb 14, 2022, 10:31 PM Well you recruited Beni because of it I knew it :savage-joy: :savage-joy: 1 Beni Feb 15, 2022, 12:12 AM I actually worked on Saturday so I can spend some time today with my lady haha but normally I'm in that gang for-sure. :fireball: 2 💚 1 Ellen Feb 15, 2022, 2:18 AM SEE Y'ALLL Ellen Feb 15, 2022, 2:18 AM Sorry devs, I didn't read that last part before posting lol .... runs away <3 Join the Slogging revolution here. :savage-joy: 2

Slack

Super

Check out these awesome writing prompts!

Portfolio

Editor and Marketing Campaign Lead at HackerNoon.

What It Feels Like to Close Two Marketing Campaigns on the Same Day

What would Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn look like if they were on the blockchain? Maybe you haven't thought about it, but the concept of blockchain-based social networks has been gaining steam for a while now—and for good reason. While modern social networks have done a lot to enable human interaction, their infrastructure and operations leave much to be desired. Widespread censorship, arbitrary algorithm changes, privacy violations, intrusive ads, and undue exploitation of creators are some complaints leveled against legacy social networks. Can blockchain technology correct the ills of centralized social networks? Well, many people think so. The idea is that blockchains can help create decentralized social media networks that are user-controlled, censorship-resistant, and private. In this article, we look at decentralized social networks and their implications. We'll also consider challenges preventing We3 social media platforms from gaining mass adoption. The Problem With Legacy Social Networks When social platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter launched, they opened up new opportunities for human interaction. People could communicate across borders, exchange information, build communities, and distribute content seamlessly. The revolutionary nature of social networks is evident in their astounding growth figures. Large social networks have billions of users combined—Facebook (2.91 billion), Twitter (290.5 million), and YouTube (2 billion). Modern social networks wield enormous power in society. For instance, show that people are spending significant portions of their lives online. As such, social networks can significantly influence our views and behaviors through the content they feed us. studies With great power, they say, comes great responsibility. However, social media companies have opted to prioritize profits ahead of user experience, safety, and wellbeing. They to provoke user activity. They and sell it to advertisers, who then populate our feeds with intrusive ads. They may even transferred between individuals. implement algorithms that promote negative content harvest user data snoop on messages But that's not all. Social media companies earn huge profits from user-generated content but hoard a large percentage of this money. Worse, content creators can be without warning, leading individuals to lose their means of livelihood. de-platformed Moreover, vague content moderation policies and centralized control have made it pretty easy for social media companies to arbitrarily censor users. This is why major platforms like Twitter and Facebook have been criticized heavily for a perceived attack on free speech rights and suppression of opinion. The centralized storage of user data by social media networks is another problem worth noting. In recent years, we’ve seen hackers breach some of the world’s biggest platforms, stealing enormous amounts of personal information. Not only does this increase the risk of identity theft, but it also makes for an unsafe online experience. What Are Decentralized Social Networks? Decentralized social networks are content creation and distribution platforms running on the blockchain. Many of these platforms attempt to correct the problems of Web2 social networks as highlighted in the previous section. So, how might a Web3 social media application work? Thankfully, we have enough examples of blockchain-based social networks to show us how these platforms may change how we interact in the future. , blockchain's answer to Medium, is a content curation platform that allows users to earn cryptocurrency based on the views their content gets. Readers can also tip content creators using the platform's native token ($STEEM). Steemit A decentralized version of Twitter may make it impossible to delete or modify tweets. Once the information is live on the blockchain, no one—not even platform owners—can take it down. This is how , a Twitter-like service running on the Ethereum blockchain works. By design, posts (called "peeps") cannot be deleted or altered once published. Such solutions will likely reduce censorship and prevent the stifling of opinion rife on centralized social networks. Peepeth Web3 social networks may reward users for their time through watch-to-earn, learn-to-earn, play-to-earn, and other incentive programs. Some may even allow users to monetize their data and exchange it for crypto—as opposed to companies solely profiting from user data. Why Blockchain Technology is Perfect for Social Media There are many reasons people want a blockchain-based version of Twitter or LinkedIn. But what really makes the blockchain ideal for running social media applications? Let's start with the basics. Blockchains are distributed across multiple computers in a peer-to-peer system that's difficult to shut down or hack. To take down a blockchain like Ethereum, you'd need to find a way to running the network. control thousands of nodes With blockchain technology, we can build robust social applications that can run forever without interruptions. Dictators would be unable to censor public opinion by applications. Neither would server crashes stop billions of people from interacting like did late last year. banning social media Facebook's crash We've already discussed the censorship-resistant nature of Web3 social media networks, but it bears mentioning again. Blockchain-based social networks are decentralized, meaning a small group of people cannot decide what can or cannot be said online. Web3 social platforms would rely on , you wouldn't need to reveal sensitive information, like your email address or location, when creating a social media account. You'd only need to connect your digital wallet to prove your identity—and that's it. decentralized identity We could use blockchain-powered cryptography to encrypt messages, enabling secure and private peer-to-peer communication. No one would read messages between you and your buddies, so you'd feel safer sharing what you like in chats. A discussion of the benefits of running social networks on the blockchain would be incomplete without discussing token economics. Many decentralized online social networks have native tokens, which members buy to unlock features, tip creators, or access certain services. The token economy creates as much value for users as it does for platform owners. In some cases, especially when social networks operate as , tokens give holders the power to vote on the direction of the project. This users-as-members system makes people more committed to the network and ensures its long-term survival. Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs) Users can tokenize content and sell it to other members of the community. For example, is a Web3-native publisher that allows writers to mint their articles as and sell them. Mirror non-fungible tokens (NFTs) Influencers and content creators could further maximize earnings by creating subscription-based content. Using built-in micropayment systems like , content creators would be able to create steady streams of income instead of relying on platform owners for earnings. Lightning Network Because blockchain projects are (mostly) open-source, users can inspect the algorithms used to control our social media feeds. No longer will Big Tech implement secret algorithms built to exploit user attention or promote divisive and harmful content. Decentralized social networks spread the hosting of user data across multiple nodes (computers) instead of storing them on a central server. This makes it harder for anyone to aggregate and sell your data, while protecting it from hackers. Challenges of Decentralized Social Networks Decentralized social networks get a lot of hype, but they are not without downsides. As we have seen, the very features that make blockchain technology ideal can also create problems. Censorship-resistant social applications are good until people start to spread dangerous messages. It would be difficult, if not downright impossible, to moderate such harmful content and protect users. While decentralized social media networks , low transaction speeds may harm user experience. Imagine having to wait 10-15 minutes for your tweet to go live on the blockchain. Or waiting for 20-30 minutes for your YouTube video to upload because the network is clogged. promise security and failure-resistant operation The immutable nature of blockchains would erase the ability to control your online activity. Today, you can delete a tweet, edit a Reddit post, or trash old Facebook pictures that may harm your reputation. In a decentralized social media landscape, your reputation on the blockchain. There's no deleting tweets or archiving old LinkedIn posts that you'd rather not have a future employer see. lives Every information that's put on the blockchain is permanent, always there for everyone to check. However, the biggest problem with decentralized social media networks has to do with the technology itself. To replace centralized client-server systems, blockchain networks need to solve several design issues. On-chain data storage is one of those problems. Blockchains were primarily developed to run applications with minimal data requirements. For example, the only information stored on the Bitcoin blockchain, or even a DeFi platform, is data related to transactions and user balances—which is negligible at best. Social media apps require larger data storage, given the amount of data users generate. Have you wondered why your Twitter or WhatsApp seems to take up more space the more you use it? It's because you're creating data—creating posts, uploading images, streaming videos, etc. more To truly scale and accept more users, decentralized social networks would need innovative solutions to solve blockchain data storage issues. Potential solutions include storing data off-chain on decentralized servers like Arweave, InterPlanetary File System (IPFS), and Filecoin. Another interesting solution is using blockchains, like , built specifically for social media applications. These blockchain networks typically have better on-chain storage, faster transaction speeds, and other features necessary for scaling social media applications. Deso Final Thoughts Decentralized social media networks are undoubtedly one of the most exciting applications of blockchain technology yet. Blockchain-powered social applications could create a safer, private, valuable, and better experience for users and fix the broken system we have currently. However, there's still a long way to go before a decentralized Twitter becomes widely accepted. Issues, such as poor scalability, data privacy, and on-chain storage, must be addressed fully before Web3 social media becomes a reality. Cover Photo by on Jeremy Bezanger Unsplash

Ethereum

Filecoin

Chain

Facebook

Twitter

YouTube

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Ethereum

Hire me to craft articles on blockchain technology!

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Ethereum

Social Media Networks are Coming to the Blockchain

The ‘Web 3.0 and Metaverse’ concepts have been heavily talked about in recent years. However, since they are still raw, with little exposure to actual use cases, it’s easy for newcomers to get lost in confusion and questions. How do these trending concepts actually go together? What are the differences and/or common ground? Do they have anything to do with all this intergalactic hype around blockchain and decentralization? How many of them are scams?! With all the “future-is-now” sensations popping up every day online, it’s really hard to keep track and have a clear picture in your mind of what is actually real. So What’s the Deal? First I’d indicate, Web 3.0 and metaverse are merely concepts (frameworks, ideologies, whatever you like), rather than official names of particular projects (I mean unless you’re Facebook and you want to flip that). They can be realized by any company that has sufficient money and the right human resources for that. stands for a new type of social online environment that goes beyond chats, content sharing, and other interactions we’re used to on platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Reddit, etc. Metaverse It’s a digital space, mainly powered by AR, VR, and AI technologies, where users can create their virtual simulated worlds and interact in them with others as if these worlds were real life. So here is the main idea: Invite your friends, who might not be in the same physical location as you, to have a beer together in a virtual pub. Work on projects with your team in a virtual office. Go on a virtual date, have virtual sex, simulate marriage, birth-giving, then divorce..so simulate any next-level thing you want without even leaving your comfy chair! [Editor’s note: Pause…] All hopefully enjoyed without losing your touch with reality. So simply put, the metaverse is like a digital alternative to LSD or ayahuasca. Probably a bit more immersive. Definitely way more expensive. Now, as for . Web 3.0 The Web 3.0 movement works on re-engineering the Internet so that people can interact with each other freely, securely, without intermediaries, as well as create their own economic environments and be in total control of their data. Web 3.0 aims to break users’ dependency on tech giants like Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc., which in fact control the Internet, accumulate users’ data, and have an unlimited capacity for its misuse. So Web 3.0 is driven by a kinda “fuck the system” non-violent anarchy mission to make the Internet such a place, where the user is king. If this sounds wishy-washy, for getting more familiar with the mission I’d recommend you to check out the by John Perry Barlow. Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace Here is the quote: “Governments of the Industrial World, you weary giants of flesh and steel, I come from Cyberspace, the new home of Mind. On behalf of the future, I ask you of the past to leave us alone. You are not welcome among us. You have no sovereignty where we gather”. If the Declaration doesn’t help much, stick with me. Below, I would add some more buzzwords in the hope that this time the picture would become clearer. Are Web 3.0 and Metaverse Compatible With Each Other? Yes, when both serve similar purposes and rely on the same technology in order to reach them. ==The case of harmony between these two worlds is a metaverse that is built upon Web 3.0, which means that it’s a decentralized virtual universe. == As mentioned earlier, Web 3 is poised to redesign the Internet in order to enable users’ freedom of interactions, as well as full control over their data and identity. Here is a , one of the pioneers and leaders of the Web 3.0 movement, explaining in the best way what’s meant : great quote by Gavin Wood by freedom of interactions “Web 3.0, or as might be termed the “post-Snowden” web, is a reimagination of the sorts of things that we already use the Web for, but with a fundamentally different model for the interactions between parties. ***Information that we assume to be public, we publish. Information that we assume to be agreed, we place on a consensus-ledger. Information that we assume to be private, we keep secret and never reveal. *** Communication always takes place over encrypted channels and only with pseudonymous identities as endpoints; never with anything traceable (such as IP addresses). In short, we engineer the system to mathematically enforce our prior assumptions, since no government or organization can reasonably be trusted.” Since I don’t want this article to turn too technical, here is just a brief summary of the core carriers of the Web 3.0 infrastructure: Decentralized Blockchain Protocols: Public, interconnected (interoperable) decentralized blockchain protocols are the foundation of Web 3. The main job of the protocols is to ensure trusted transactions between users, strong privacy in their interactions, as well as distributed and censorship-resistant data storage. Smart Contracts: They are the key facilitators of blockchain protocols’ work. Smart contracts are programs that automatically self-execute upon certain conditions being met. They are tamper-resistant, which means excluding the risk of any interference, or modification of their terms in any way. In Web 3, among other things, they also drive such important elements of its ecosystem, like DAOs and distributed data storage. DAOs: A DAO, or “Decentralized Autonomous Organization,” is Unlike traditional companies, DAOs eliminate the hierarchy of corporate management bodies and offer a model of decentralized governance. a community-led online entity with no central authority. Voting, decision making, distribution of dividends, execution of the agreed-upon decisions, and other business-related matters are regulated by the rules laid down in blockchain-based smart contracts and performed by them automatically. This is done to exclude any risk of human error or manipulation with votes. Neither a sleazy CEO nor pushy shareholders would have any chance to manipulate the entity’s work to their benefit. The point is that it’s safer to rely on algorithms, rather than on humanity’s goodwill. We all know man is weak. If you’d like to learn about types of DAOs, check out Metagame Wiki and have a lot of fun. Distributed Data Storage: What does this mean? The vision is to ensure that users’ information is stored sliced to multiple independent network nodes, instead of one server that is not under users’ control. This distributed approach will procure high-quality data protection, as well as enable users to manage their data, encrypt and keep it private, authorize access to data, and backup the storage. Crypto Payment Networks: It would be nothing new to say that crypto pioneered the principles of decentralization and anonymity, which are now at the core of Web 3.0. Contrary to fiat payments, which immediately bring nation-state borders along with regulatory complexities and limitations, crypto has offered an alternative financial paradigm — peer-to-peer trustless and anonymous transactions with no middleman involved. One might object that anonymity in crypto is questionable, as there are many use cases when a user is tracked and required to provide a bunch of intimate information about themselves. That’s true. But here is the obvious solution: Stop using centralized intermediaries, like giant exchanges, investments apps, or payment gates, to make your life easier in crypto. Yep, they take care of everything. They make your relationships with crypto easier and supposedly worry-free. They are your wallets, private key keepers, brokers, custodians, clearing centers — they are your everything. But they are still intermediaries, which is not native to crypto. Actually, the idea behind crypto is to kick out intermediaries and stimulate peer-to-peer economic relationships. Please always bear this in mind. Each time it comes to intermediaries, you give up the benefits of anonymity, as well as the other perks that crypto offers. Period. I don’t like the buzzword “ ” but you do have to be conscious about how your goals line up with your actions and choices. This is especially true for crypto. consciousness, That was a side note. Now let’s get back to Web 3.0. For crypto-native businesses built upon it, crypto would not only be a means of payments or raising capital (as it was in the wild ICO times), but also as an incentive mechanism to create a community, build engagement, and provide feedback on products in development. At long last, this will facilitate the shift towards an “upgraded version” of the sharing economy. Don’t run away now. I’ll explain it simply and in a few words. looks like we are doing business relying on giants (like Facebook or Google). We accept their terms and conditions, please their algorithms, give away our data, often pay huge commissions, and let them control the content we create. economy In today’s sharing Now : We kick the giants out and do everything peer-to-peer with the use of blockchain, as well as the power of community engagement and a fair incentives mechanism and distribution of value. Web 3.0’s sharing economy Actually, this is still the same as Web 3.0’s tone of voice. Wrapping it up on the question of Web 3.0 and metaverse relatability: They are the perfect match when Web 3.0 is the base and metaverse is its superstructure. A truly “kosher” metaverse is one that is open-source, runs on a public blockchain, is interoperable, enables decentralized data storage, is crypto native, and has no center of control. In an ideal world, both metaverse and Web 3.0 are interlinked and play their music in sync. Now let’s look at how close we are to this synchronicity now. What’s going on now? Currently, there are a few upper-echelon tech companies that have announced their stake in the “metaverse”: Apple, Microsoft, Google, Nvidia, Epic Games, Facebook, etc. The last is talking the loudest and some time ago even rebranded for Meta. Despite all the noise, there is still not so much concrete information about how these metaverses would look in their final versions. Many of them try to appear as Web 3.0 related. That’s understandable. As the power of hype and marketing has no limits, this way of self-positioning is no doubt strategically wise. But wait a minute! These are exactly the same guys who control the Internet right now and drive the existing controversial “top-down” economic model of Web 2. Some of them are famous for their skill in manipulating users’ data, as well as for their practices of successfully selling it outside without the users’ consent. Web 3.0 offers to knock them off the pedestal and build a sharing economy instead, as we discussed earlier. So where is the common ground? My answer: there is none. In fact, these corporate-owned metaverses offer us the same old well-known practices of market power misuse. Despite all their play with trendy words and even the integration of crypto payments, they still remain centralized and will keep collecting your private data on their servers. However, now in a more extensive way. Your activities in their virtual worlds, and your interactions with other people, would let them make such a deep and detailed behavioral portrait of you, which couldn’t be done even by 1,00,500 psychologists therapizing you for years. They will track you to the end, and no one knows what it could mean for your future. Just look at them closer. The idea of a revolution that doesn’t change the distribution of power seems kind of ridiculous. Same key players, same corporate mindsets, same sources of revenue. Why should they be expected to create a really new economy, while the old practices worked for them perfectly? Just rebrand and keep going. The good news, is there are still some examples of decentralized metaverses out there that seem to really overlap with Web 3. I purposely don’t list them here, as I haven’t had a chance yet to analyze them thoroughly. So, Google is your friend here. I hope you’ll share your findings with me later in the comments 👍. Key Takeaway To answer the question of the compatibility of Web 3.0 and metaverses, we need to look at the similarities of their technological frameworks, as well as the backgrounds of those who stand behind those projects. Don’t let the hype misguide you. Keep educating yourself on this new decentralized economy — it’s closer than you think! Also published . here

Harmony

Amazon

Apple

BUNCH

Google

Microsoft

NVIDIA

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Career Development

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Founder Stories

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Growth

2022 - the Greatest Storyteller

Let's connect on LinkedIn!

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Growth

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Founder Stories

Nominated for 2022 - the Greatest Storyteller

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Career Development

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Fintech

Web 3.0 and the Metaverse Walk Into a Bar...

Photo by on Chris Lawton Unsplash Citing a as evidence of a nationwide problem, the U.S. Department of Justice, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and other agencies announced a new initiative Friday to combat discriminatory mortgage lending practices. recent investigation by The Markup , Rohit Chopra, the director of the CFPB, said an all-hands approach is required to combat the “endemic” practice of redlining, the term for denying mortgages in neighborhoods with high populations of Black people and immigrants, once encouraged by the federal government. He said that includes fighting “digital redlining” by algorithms used to decide who gets a mortgage. At the press conference “These algorithms are black boxes behind brick walls,” Chopra said. “When families and regulators do not know how decisions are made by these algorithms, we are unable to participate in a fair and competitive market free from illegal bias.” The new multi-agency effort will increase government analyses of lending patterns with an eye toward fair lending, task state attorneys general with enforcing fair lending practices more stringently, and strengthen reporting pipelines between the Department of Justice and “financial regulatory agencies” to identify fair lending violations. The Department of Justice described the Combating Redlining Initiative as its “most aggressive” attempt to curb the practice. This push comes after The Markup’s August investigation, which held constant 17 variables, including factors that the lending industry previously said would explain away lending disparities. We found the disparities continued. Lenders nationwide were more likely to deny people of color than White applicants. They were 80 percent more likely to deny Black applicants than similarly qualified White applicants with similar incomes, debt-to-income, combined loan-to-value ratios, and many other key factors. Chopra cited that finding in his remarks—and criticized the mortgage industry’s response. At the time, the industry argued that The Markup’s analysis wasn’t complete because it didn’t include credit scores, a key component in their decision-making. “Their defense illuminates the problem,” he said. “Black-box underwriting decisions are not necessarily creating a more level playing field and actually may be exacerbating the biases that feed into them.” The Mortgage Bankers Association did not respond to requests for comment on Friday, and the American Bankers Association declined to comment. The Home Mortgage Disclosure Act requires financial institutions to report applicants’ credit scores, but the CFPB does not make them available in the public version of the dataset, citing consumer privacy. The government agency also withholds the decisions made by algorithms required by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two quasi-governmental agencies that buy about half of the mortgages made in the country. As part of the new effort, the Department of Justice announced a proposed settlement with a Mississippi-based lender, Trustmark National Bank. to “majority-white neighborhoods” in Memphis, Tenn., between 2014 and 2018, discriminating against Black and Latino prospective borrowers. The bank was accused of targeting its financial services , and a court still needs to approve the agreement for it to take effect. The bank did not admit fault as part of the settlement If approved, Trustmark would pay a $5 million civil penalty to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, pay $3.85 million to create a fund to subsidize loans for residents of Black and Latino neighborhoods in the metro area, and pay for outreach and financial education efforts around the area. “We fully cooperated with the agencies and have entered into these settlements to avoid the distraction of protracted litigation,” Duane Dewey said in a statement, “and because we share the common goals of breaking down barriers to home financing and exploring innovative ways to help residents of underserved areas achieve the dream of homeownership.” Trustmark CEO As part of our investigation, The Markup also looked at the lending patterns of individual lenders and between people of color and their White counterparts in 2019. found seven financial institutions that produced the widest disparities Among them were three lenders associated with the largest homebuilders in the country, DHI Mortgage, Lennar Mortgage, and Pulte Mortgage. These three companies were more likely to deny Black and Latino applicants than similarly qualified White applicants. The seven lenders previously told The Markup that they don’t deny people based on their race or ethnicity, that they follow the law, and that The Markup’s findings did not accurately reflect their lending patterns. Two lenders said that the data used for the analysis can’t provide an accurate and complete picture of their lending patterns because of the data’s limitations. “Today, we are committing ourselves to address modern-day redlining by making far more robust use of our fair lending authorities,” U.S. attorney general Merrick Garland said at Friday’s multi-agency press conference. “We will spare no resource to ensure that federal fair lending laws are vigorously enforced and that financial institutions provide equal opportunity for every American to obtain credit.” Correction An earlier version of this story described Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as nonprofit corporations. They are quasi-governmental agencies. Written by: and Emmanuel Martinez Malena Carollo Originally published . here

Fannie Mae

Freddie Mac

Lennar

Nationwide

Every dollar you donate helps support The Markup’s work.

Read My Stories

Will the U.S. Government do Anything About Mortgage Rate Discrimination?

Reporting on various programs and projects is an integral part of gauging the success of your nonprofit's activities. This exercise is crucial not only to internal stakeholders, but also to funders, donors, and the world at large. Data visualizations are arguably the most effective way to translate large amounts of information into bite-sized pieces that are easier for others to digest. In fact, data visualization is the only way to convey certain data in a comprehensible way, such as those data that are found using heat maps (which we'll get to later). Just as cooking combines various ingredients to create a memorable experience through a particular meal, data visualization can bring together many different pieces of information into a central — and memorable — format. These digestible pieces can be visualized through various tools, such as Tableau and Power BI, and coding languages such as R or Python. But regardless of the chosen tool, data visualization can feel daunting. You might find yourself asking these questions: How and where should I incorporate data visualizations? How many charts should I include? Which ones should I use? Let's address these questions and dive deeper into how you can craft the right recipe for your target audience, your data, and your nonprofit. GET TABLEAU GET MICROSOFT POWER BI How to Incorporate Data Visualizations Into Your Reports Data visualizations break up the monotony of text and make your reports more insights-focused and data-driven. But it's important that you don't see the use of data visualizations as an "add-on" to your research (or, to use the cooking analogy — a garnish). Thinking about impact and measurement in terms of how you might visualize key data related to your programs should be part of your reporting process from the very start. Data visualizations prevent your reader from becoming overwhelmed. Using them allows you to educate the reader and humanize the data by providing context and insights through a story — as opposed to long lists of facts and figures. But this narrative, as told through your visualizations, should still be supplemented with text. This combination will help transform complex topics into something more comprehensible — and enjoyable — for the reader. So, rather than a garnish, data visualizations are more like key ingredients that are necessary to make your "meal" more palatable. For example, at the end of the year, you'll probably need to communicate all that your organization has achieved over the past 12 months. Instead of describing a lengthy list of the programs you offered, the cities in which the programs were offered, and how many people accessed those programs, you can, instead, create a map with this data. The map could have a dot placed in the location where programs were held with the color of the dot representing the different types of programs offered and the dot size representing the volume of people who attended. These types of visualizations help walk the reader through your findings and support the related text. They also keep the report condensed, while still highlighting key information. For general reports, a best practice might be to include two or three visualizations such as these. This should be enough to highlight information without becoming visually overwhelming for the audience. It is important to note that a new chart should only be included if the information being conveyed cannot be combined in a previous chart using techniques such as color-coding or sizing representations. Each additional chart should provide additional value in order to avoid redundancy. How to Select Which Visualization to Use Data visualizations are the key ingredients in your recipe. But what flavors should you use? When visualizing data, you should select the charts that best fit the data being visualized, as well as what they should communicate to the reader. One of the important questions to ask yourself is, "What is the story I want to convey?" Once the key takeaways are identified, selecting the best method to communicate them becomes easier. When selecting the correct visualization, keep in mind how many variables are being conveyed, the amount of context your target audience requires, and the insights you wish to illustrate. You will not be able to communicate everything through visualizations; therefore, realistic expectations should be made about what are the most important aspects. Bar Charts The most simple and effective charts to use are bar charts. They are ideal for data that has both numerical and categorical values. For instance, bar charts can be used to show the distribution of data, such as the diversity of the people attending a program. With such a chart, you can more easily pinpoint the demographic not being targeted and adjust accordingly. Bar charts are also very easy to convey multiple variables in one chart since they can be stacked or color-coded for side-by-side comparisons. One such example can be seen below, in which bar charts are used to compare the number of females and males who attended five distinct programs (note: all of the examples below feature data generated for a "generic" nonprofit). Maps If your data contains any geolocation information, maps are the most effective way to communicate such information. A map can be used to represent both specific data points and aggregated data. Maps can be used to highlight the specific number of programs offered in a given zip code, as well as an average number of programs per zip code. The image below shows a collection of programs our sample nonprofit offered in Southern California and clearly highlights the lack of diversity of such programs. Now stakeholders will be able to use these insights when deliberating which type of programs to provide going forward. Pie Charts One of the most frequently used visualization tools is pie charts. However, pie charts are also frequently used incorrectly. They are only ideal for information involving data with small variation — generally, three or four categories (left image). Pie charts should not be used to convey data that has too many categories since the smaller the slices become, the more difficult it is to distinguish differences or trends (right image). If your organization offers three to four different types of community programs and you wanted to convey the attendance to each program type, then a pie chart would be acceptable. However, if you host 20 events a year, your audience would have greater difficulty understanding the attendance breakdown via a pie chart. Line Charts Line charts are excellent tools for data involving time, particularly long periods of time. They are ideal for illustrating changes in data, such as a positive growth trajectory or a negative declining pattern. Such visualizations are best suited for numerical data and data collected frequently over a given time period. Below, the line chart allows us to more easily see trends in attendance to our nonprofit's events in 2019. For instance, we see that attendance begins high in the early months of the year for both males and females but then drops significantly around June. Dual Axis Chart When you have three different datasets and want to show a relationship between them, dual-axis charts are the best method to do this. They are optimal for datasets with two numerical variables and one categorical variable. For instance, this chart can be used to compare both the total number of attendees to a workshop and the total amount spent on that workshop on either -axis, grouped by month on the -axis. It will show the correlation between attendees and the amount spent. y x In this case, the number of attendees increased as the amount spent also increased. Heat Map Heat maps are ideal mechanisms for displaying correlation among many data elements. These use varying colors or saturation to illustrate a scale of correlation from low to high. A best practice for heat maps is to select a single color, such as blue, and simply vary the color in saturation to illustrate the range from low correlation, light blue, to high correlation, dark blue. It is important to note that heat maps make comparing correlations on either side of the extremes easy, but they can make it difficult to compare correlations that are similar since the saturation of the colors will also be very similar. As illustrated below, It is easy to see that there is a greater attendance to the education-centered programs in comparison to the nutrition-focused ones. However, it is challenging to see how much of a difference in attendance there is between the health and parenting programs. Bubble Chart A scatter plot is a chart that displays data points as dots on an - and -axis. Bubble charts are very similar, but add a third element — the size of the dots. Instead of having numerous data points of the same value, the points are combined and represented by the size of the dot (bubble) instead. x y Thus, bubble charts are great solutions for combining two to three different data types. A real-world example includes plotting the age of attendees by the total number of workshop hours attended and then color-coding the bubbles to show the relationship by gender. It will help you identify and show otherwise confusing trends in a manner that is better understood by your reader. Key Takeaways Data visualization is a powerful tool that can elevate your reports, make them more engaging, and convey much more information than text alone. Regardless of the tool that you use to create them, charts will help better portray the story within your data. Thus, it is imperative that you select the correct charts based on your data type and the key insights you wish to highlight. Remember to keep visualizations clean, clear, and concise in order to maintain the bite-sized attribute. As the "chef" of your report, you need to keep the flavors of your meal complementary to one another and avoid cluttering things up too much. Pick just the right number of visualizations — those that best support your findings in the most comprehensive ways — and make sure that they shine through in relationship to your overall narrative. Using data visualizations in the right way will make your report a "meal to remember." So don't cut corners during the planning process, make sure that you have all the ingredients you need, and create something that people will want to share with others. Written by: Alejandra Budar Co-published here: https://blog.techsoup.org/posts/how-nonprofits-can-leverage-data-visualization

Canon

ORANGE

Southern

Target

Help nonprofits around the world get the resources they need

Explore Different Ways You Can Use Data Visualization to Help Your Nonprofit

Hello, guys, this is the third part of SOLID Principles in JavaScript and if you haven't read the previous two ( and ), I highly recommend to read them first and come back here. first part second part " " - Liskov Substitution Principle. This principle says: . L if S is a subtype of T, then objects of type T in a program may be replaced with objects of type S without altering any of the desirable properties of that program Yes, I know, from the definition it's really unclear. Let's try to explain a little bit differently: functions that use pointers or references to base classes must be able to use objects of derived classes without knowing it. And yes, the second definition is also not such good for describing. Let me describe it a little bit simpler way. For example, you have class "Car", and you use this class in different places. This principle says, that each place, where you use the "Car" class, could be replaced (if needed) with any subclassed of the Car class. So, if we have class "passenger car" which inherits from "Car" class or if we have "SUV" class, which also inherits from "Car" class and if we need to replace from "car" class to "SUV" or "passenger" class, after replacing from one class to any of subclasses, our system should work properly as before. If you don't understand yet, let me show you some examples which should help you. The first easy and common example is about shapes. We have a "Rectangle" class.  From a mathematics point of view, "Square" is also "Rectangle". Knowing this, we can create a base "Rectangle" class and "Square" class, which extends from "Rectangle" We created a simple "Rectangle" class, which has width, height, and methods. Now, let's create "Square" and extends from "Rectangle", because as we know, "Square" is a "Rectangle". But, "Square" calculate area in a little bit different way, our height and width should be the same, so, let's rewrite a little bit our setWidth, setHeight logic: Let's look at an example, of how can we use our classes, we will create 2 instances, check the area, after that change size and check the area again: We can see that everything is ok and our code works as expected. No problems. But, let's look at Liskov Substitution Principle once more: If we change our base class for any of the subclasses, our system should work as before. Let's do it and check it. We will change from the "Rectangle" class to the "Square" class. See the example below, I changed from to and that's all: new Rectangle() new Square() The code, before changing the size works the same, result of the same. But, after returns, a different result, not that was before (and it should return a different value). But now, we break the Liskov Substitution principle. getArea() setWidth(), getArea() How can we solve it? The solution is to make inheritance, not from the "Rectangle" class, but prepare a more "correct" class for this. Just, for example, create some "Shape" class, that will calculate only area. Let's see: So, now, we created a more common base class Shape and if we use this somewhere, we can easily change from "Shape" to any of his subclasses, without breaking logic. new Shape() In our example, Rectangle and Square are different objects, that contain a little bit similar logic, but at the same time different logic. So, it will be more correct to divide them and not to use them as a "Parent-Child" class. Let's take a look at another example, it's not mine, but it is good for describing and understanding this principle. We want to create a "Bird" class. And we are thinking about which methods should be there. From the first point of view, we could think to add the method "fly" because all birds can fly. And now, we want to create birds and say them fly: Ok, after that, we realized that we have different kinds of birds and we want to create them: ducks, parrots, and swans: And now, Liskov Substitution Principle says, that if we want to change from base class to subclass, the system should work, as it was before: And yes, we changed arguments when we call "fly" function, instead of new Bird, now we call new Duck(), new Parrot(), new Swan(). Everything is still working and we correctly follow the Liskov Substitution Principle. And now, we understand, that we want to add one more bird, a penguin. But, unfortunately, penguins can't fly.  So, what we do, we will throw an error, if someone wants to call the "fly" method: But now, we have a problem, our fly method doesn't expect error inside it and the "fly" function was created only for that birds, who can fly. Penguins can't fly, so we break Liskov Substitution Principle. What is the solution? Instead of creating a base "Bird" class and using it as a flying bird, let's create a Flying bird class and all birds, who can fly, will extend only from Flying bird class and our "fly" function, will accept only Flying birds: Notice, our Penguin class extends just from Bird class, not from FlyingBird and that's why now, we don't need the fly method, which throws an error. Now, at any time, if we call somewhere new FlyingBird, and after it, we want to make a more specific bird, like Duck, Parrot, Swan we can easily change them instead of FlyingBird, and our code will work without problem. That's all for today and I really hope now you can better understand the Liskov Substitution Principle, how it is works in the Javascript world and how you can use it in your project. In the next article, we will continue to learn SOLID and the next " " letter. L See you there.

Different

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Best Practices

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Design

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Functional Programming

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Performance

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Design

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Performance

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Functional Programming

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Best Practices

SOLID Principles in JavaScript: What Does the "L" Stand For?

Startups aren't only built by amazing ideas and funds, there have to be employees who are eager to make it work, and this comes with motivation. For each person, it takes a different strategy. Motivation can take many forms: from monetary compensation to feedback. In this slogging thread, the startup hustle community shared some thoughts about what they thought were the best motivation strategies, and what worked best for them This Slogging thread by Sara Pinto, Mónica Freitas, Jack Boreham, Teri Eyenike and Abeer occurred in slogging's official #startup-hustle channel, and has been edited for readability. Sara Pinto Jan 20, 2022, 8:56 PM What do you think is the best strategy to motivate employees? What do you think would work for you? Mónica Freitas Jan 20, 2022, 9:10 PM Sara Pinto some companies give employees bonuses for big wins, extra hours, big sales, etc. I think that's a great way to keep people motivated throughout the year. Mónica Freitas Jan 20, 2022, 9:10 PM Also, having a 1O1 monthly meeting could be great to check on the work progress for each employee, see how both parties could improve and evolve, etc. Mónica Freitas Jan 20, 2022, 9:11 PM In short, if a company actually cares about its employees' wellbeing, then employees will return in the effort. Oh, and companies should start opening space for people to choose if they want to work remotely or from the office. Jack Boreham Jan 26, 2022, 10:20 AM Employee bonuses, shares in the company and making it entirely publically owned is a huge motivator! Sara Pinto Feb 7, 2022, 12:00 PM Mónica Freitas That's all great ideas! And I also agree. The most important thing is to see our work compensated in whatever way it is. Which of them do you think would work best for you? Sara Pinto Feb 7, 2022, 12:05 PM Mónica Freitas Do you think that always having the option for remote work is a good thing? Sara Pinto Feb 7, 2022, 12:06 PM Jack Boreham Does it work for you? Sara Pinto Feb 7, 2022, 12:06 PM Abeer Limarc Ambalina Teri Eyenike Linh Smooke Daniel Guzman what's your opinion on this? 👀 1 Teri Eyenike Feb 7, 2022, 12:17 PM The way to motivate is by offering employees autonomy in their work and contributing ideas to the success of the organisation asides from the perks for the jobs. Also, I think companies now assign a learning budget to motivate employees for growth. Jack Boreham Feb 7, 2022, 12:28 PM Well-being is important, but a team should be working together for a common goal. Giving workers incentives for ownership is always good. 💚 1 🔥 1 Mónica Freitas Feb 7, 2022, 4:10 PM Sara Pinto For me, it would be the bonuses for sure. How about you? Mónica Freitas Feb 7, 2022, 4:13 PM Sara Pinto, I do. Maybe it won't work for every sector or company, but you should open that window when possible. It'd make it easier for a lot of people to maintain their job: newborn parents, people that suffer from some health condition that makes commutes a challenge, not having to relocate or being able to assist loved ones (if they're sick, for instance) while maintaining the work rhythm. Sara Pinto Feb 8, 2022, 11:46 AM I agree Teri Eyenike. Perks are good, but there has to be something more to them, not only to make the job "worth it" but to make it an ever-evolving space as well. That learning budget seems really interesting! Once again, being able to grow in the workplace is a valuable advantage ✅ 1 Sara Pinto Feb 8, 2022, 11:57 AM Mónica Freitas I would say it has to be a mix of financial motivation, and promoting the workplace as a space for collaboration and evolution 🔥 1 Sara Pinto Feb 8, 2022, 11:59 AM Mónica Freitas I agree. But I can't help but think that motivation through a computer can be more challenging. Remote work has many benefits but sometimes lacks dynamic energy. Do you think that motivation for remote work can be more demanding? Mónica Freitas Feb 8, 2022, 1:51 PM Sara Pinto for sure! It is always best when you have a team to back you up and help you evolve professionally 🔥 1 Mónica Freitas Feb 8, 2022, 1:53 PM Sara Pinto I think there can be more distractions, but it's just a matter of what works best for you. I appreciate the freedom and flexibility that come with remote work. And to be honest, I wouldn't trade it for an office job. But to each its own, I guess. I'm assuming you're more of an office person... Sara Pinto Feb 9, 2022, 3:55 PM Mónica Freitas I haven't tried an office yet haha. I appreciate how remote work can be flexible, but I'm afraid many times the distractions take the best of me. Plus, I think it can be more challenging to motivate. Meetings help, but I think the actual presence would be more interesting Mónica Freitas Feb 10, 2022, 11:45 AM Sara Pinto, I think you'll need to try an office job in the future and get this conundrum sorted 😂 as soon as you do, you'll know what works for you 🔥 1 Abeer Feb 13, 2022, 6:53 AM Sara Pinto Definitely some shares of the company so they’ll have a vested interest in seeing the startup grow. Also, assuming it’s economically feasible, encouraging employees to do side projects could be a great source of ideas, improvements, and additional revenue. Google encourages their employees to spend 20% of their time on side projects and have seen successful products come out of it like Gmail. Sara Pinto Feb 14, 2022, 12:21 PM Abeer The shares idea is really interesting. It will motivate you to help the company grow for sure! I had no idea that Gmail started as a side project, but I can see how taking time for those activities can help with creativity and create a good workplace environment

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Climate Change

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Climate Change

What's the Best Motivation Strategy?

Today, Web3 is nothing more than an emerging idea. It's an idea that a lot of people don't know how to explain yet. Despite that, a lot of people are already spending a lot of money on getting a piece of that cake. The idea of a Web3 will only continue to get popular. And celebrity patronage is a big reason for that. The biggest example of celebrity patronage of Web3 is something called the . Ten years ago, or even five years ago, something called the Snoopverse would have probably been in reference to part of a song by Snoop Dogg. Snoopverse However, the Snoopverse today refers to a virtual platform that exists on The Sandbox. The Snoopverse, says Snoop Dogg, will be a virtual space for concerts, art exhibits, and pool parties. It would essentially be a virtual replica of the rapper's mansion in California. And here's where things get trippy. If you want early access to the Snoopverse, you'd have to be willing to part with up to $2,000. Given that there will be up to 5,000 tickets, it means that Snoopverse could potentially be making ten million dollars from early access tickets to the Snoopverse alone. That's a lot of money. And, shockingly, Snoop Dogg isn't the only celebrity that's getting in on the Web3 hype. Paris Hilton, one of the biggest celebrities in the world, recently announced that she too would be building something like the Snoopverse. The only difference is that it would be called Paris World. Honestly, we feel "Paris'' would have been just as adequate, but we've got no say in the matter. Like the Snoopverse, Paris World would also be a virtual location with digital copies of Paris Hilton's homes and most importantly — her wardrobe. The wave of celebrities buying into the Web3 economy doesn't stop at Paris Hilton and Snoop Dogg alone. There are many others, like , , and even Justin Bieber Leo Messi Steph Curry. Given the high price of NFTs and almost everything important that has to do with Web3, it's easy to assume that the system was built specifically for the rich and powerful. For example, the are worth a fortune and are completely out of the reach of most people. Bored Ape Yacht club NFTs To the layperson, all of this may mean that Web3 is just a playground for the rich and powerful. Not Just for the Rich However, this aspect of Web3 should not surprise anyone at all. Mainly because that's how almost every important innovation in the world works. To understand this, let's look at the history of two of the most important inventions in human history; the airplane and the telephone. When the airplane was first invented, many people saw it as nothing but a death trap. It was the early 20th century, and people were certainly not looking forward to strapping themselves to a flying box and going thousands of feet in the air. Thankfully, a few people thought it would be worthwhile to do so. That's why they bought into the idea. But buying the idea alone wasn't enough. They didn't just have to believe that a plane could fly them thousands of miles overland. They also had to pay through their noses for it to happen. The first commercial airliner was established in 1914, and Yes. $400. And it was a mere 23 minutes flight. Today, over a hundred years later, some flights go for as low as $36. one ticket for a flight at the time cost around $400. The same goes for the telephone. The first phones were impossibly expensive, and could only be owned by the richest people. But as time went on, and the economics of scale kicked in, it became accessible to more people. There are hundreds of other examples like the automobile, personal computers, and even things as basic as a radio. And it's the same with Web3. The metaverse, a huge part of the infrastructure of Web3, will cost a lot of money. Not in access to the web itself, but in access to the tools to access it. Since it will be a virtual world, it will cost a lot more in data to be in the metaverse. And that's not adding the cost of VR equipment you'd need to actually experience the world. When one adds that to the cost of buying land, NFTs, and crypto to live in that world, the costs start to add up very quickly. Benefits of Getting Into Web3 Early But this doesn't mean that people should wait for the costs of Web3 to go down before accessing it. Web3 is different from most other innovations in the sense that it isn't just an innovation. It isn't just a shiny new technology. It's also a shiny new opportunity. Right now, the world of the metaverse is very sparsely populated. But the world is already growing. Already, a " ” exists. The metamall is exactly what it sounds like; a mall in the metaverse where you can buy, sell, play, meet, and even stake all sorts of things from all corners of the metaverse. “Metamallers” will be able to earn real rewards by selling, leasing, or staking assets, competing in various games, putting on performances, or hosting other events. metamall There's also the initiative that's focused on dragging the music industry, kicking and screaming no doubt, into Web3. And the initiative is doing this by focusing on providing the best virtual experience for the fans. Even though the project is still technically early–it hasn’t even launched its token yet–Busta Rhythms, Future, and Alicia Keys have already conducted live concerts on this platform, with an artist from the UK, Examine, as the next confirmed set. Animal Concerts Like every important innovation before it, Web3 will be somewhat difficult to get into at first. It might even be somewhat expensive too. But as time goes on, and more people get on board, the barrier to entry will get lowered. It happened with airplanes, motor cars, electric vehicles, and it's even happening with space exploration right now. It will most certainly happen with web3. The celebrities that are paying over the odds to get a good piece of Web3 real estate right now are part of that process. Their increased involvement only means that a Web3 that everyone can enjoy easily is closer now than ever. These celebrities aren't doing it because they love giving out their money. They are doing it because they understand the value of being the first in the door. Thankfully, even regular people like us, with a little bit of imagination, can be first too. After all, a With even more imagination, there's no limit to what we could do with an early interest in the internet of the future. Bored Ape NFT was only selling for $190 in April of 2021. Lead Picture Courtesy of freepik.com

The Sandbox

Roblox

What Celebrity Patronage Means For Web3 and the Metaverse

Tom Brady will go down as one of the greatest football players of all time. Love him or hate him; there is zero doubt about that. His achievements are legendary. He blew past milestones people never thought were possible (and setting records) one can only hope to see broken in their lifetime. One of the essential qualities to Tom Brady’s game is —his leadership has taken him to the biggest stages in the country, getting the maximum talent and productivity out of his teams for the longest time. And while you may not be married to a supermodel or have Tom Brady’s arm, the GOAT can teach us valuable lessons on leadership that we can apply to our own lives. But to understand his lessons on leadership, we must first understand what kind of leader Tom Brady is. his leadership skills What kind of leader is Tom Brady? Brady is best known for . His work ethic and dedication to the game are evident for his teammates to see.  He embodies self-determination, self-discipline, and self-regulation. Unlike many stars in the league, Brady started his NFL career as a 6th round draft pick, virtually condemning him never to make it big. However, because of his hard work, belief in himself, and passion for the game, he remained ready for any opportunity at any time. When starting quarterback Drew Bledsoe was injured at the start of the New England Patriots’ 2001 season, Brady was prepared to step up to the plate (wrong sport, but the analogy works). leading by example Being drafted late may have been a blessing in disguise for Brady’s career—he is one of the few players to have experienced what it’s like a player starting at the bottom and working at the league's highest levels. He leaves the impression that his status is achievable, but shows others through his actions why he is the best. For those around him, Brady exists as the epitome of a success story, from a bottom pick to the greatest to ever play the game. Through his story, he has shown that hard work can genuinely create paths to success. Brady has gained a reputation of being remarkably consistent, constantly training, learning from his mistakes, and performing at a constant level. He has never been known for his athleticism like other elite NFL players; it’s one of the primary reasons he was such a late draft selection. While he has never been able to become the most athletic player in his career, Brady has undoubtedly been able to compensate and minimize his flaws through hard work and relentless focus. He isn’t the fastest player; however, he has developed an elite level of awareness that helps him avoid the defense. By working on his flaws to become a well-rounded player, Tom Brady has been able to find success. What’s remarkable is that Tom Brady has been able to impart this success on others. Using himself as his best example, he shows others what it takes to be the greatest player of all time. That leadership by example is magnified by the fact that he was overlooked at the top of the draft. His dedication and focus got him to the top of the game, and that’s inspiring for his teammates. It brings out the best in those around him as they focus on a singular goal. The idea of leading by example is not exclusive to football, of course. Leading a team in business or leading a team in football requires the same skill set. Leading by example is an excellent way to prove your legitimacy and dedication to others. One common misconception about leading by example is that the leaders are silent, mind their own business, and are generally unapproachable. However, from the told by other players about Brady, he is . Even though he is the first in the facility and last to leave every day, Brady always engages with others, talking to them and coaching them. He leaves the impression that his status is achievable but shows others why he is the best through his actions. This idea can be applied to more mundane work as well. Leading by example is not about leaving your team in awe of your work and achievements; instead, it is about showing that your high level of work ethic is possible and achievable for others. Delivering results underlines what you can achieve with his level of dedication. stories far from a silent leader Brady is also known amongst players for . When with his team, he is both personal and personable. There is no ego to deal with, despite his rarified stature. He understands the winning culture and what it takes to achieve great things at the highest level and under tremendous pressure – and in his case, physical pain. keeping a positive yet competitive team environment Because of this, Brady becomes the biggest supporter of his teammates. He understands that while he may be an outstanding player, football is a team sport, and everyone has a role to play. Brady is motivated to teach others what it takes to win, even in his position. He exemplifies this by becoming a second coach, making adjustments to improve the play, and reassuring each player they have what it takes to be a winner. His winning pedigree backs up his advice: he commands the players' full attention in the locker room. On a personal level, Brady to younger players, showing the areas of improvement while also taking the time to train them and answer any questions they may have. So long as the players are willing to get better, Brady is committed to teaching them what he knows – and those players know that Tom Brady has elevated his status in the league from a backup to an x-time world champ. They want to eat whatever Tom is eating. acts as a mentor Brady also exemplifies outstanding leadership by . , Brady went the extra mile to reward his long-time teammate Rob Gronkowski. Despite the resistance from his coaches, Brady opted to stay in a blowout game to throw an extra pass to Gronkowski, netting him a $500,000 bonus for achieving his completion goal. It’s a perfect example of listening to your teammates, understanding what they want, achieving their goals together, and rewarding them for their effort. aligning personal and team objectives for more established players During his tenure on the Tampa Bay Buccaneers While his personal achievements are impressive, Brady also assists his teammates, constantly and risking injury to achieve other players' personal and team goals for other players. His actions instill trust in others and ultimately motivate them to play harder and contribute to the winning culture that Brady is known for. putting his reputation on the line Like Brady’s story, these traits are achievable in the business world. Please get to know your team, understand their desires and motivations, and construct a plan to achieve their goals. Lead by example, showing others what an elite level looks like, but also be on the ground, pushing your team higher and higher towards that level. Success isn’t achieved overnight, but over time, through effort and dedication, expect to see you and your team grow to their fullest potential. About the Author Lomit Patel is the Senior Vice President of Growth at Together Labs (formerly IMVU). Before Together labs, Lomit managed growth at early-stage startups, including Roku (IPO), TrustedID (acquired by Equifax), Texture (acquired. by Apple), and EarthLink. Lomit is a public speaker, author, advisor, and recognized as a Mobile Hero by Liftoff. Lomit's book Lean AI , part of Eric Ries' best-selling "The Lean Startup" series, is now available at Amazon .

2022 - All About Teamwork

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Management And Leadership

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Motivation

Super Career Strategist of 2022

LEAN AI - #1 Best Selling Book by Lomit

2021 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - LEAN-STARTUP

2021 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - MOTIVATION

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Management And Leadership

Nominated for Super Career Strategist of 2022

Nominated for 2022 - All About Teamwork

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Motivation

Chief Growth Office, Tynker 

How to Become the Greatest Leader of All Time: Tom Brady Style

From the traditional Waterfall model to more iterative approaches like Agile and DevOps, software testing is constantly evolving. And while teams have worked their way to deliver quality at speed, there seems to be something holding them back. Read on to learn about in-sprint automation and why it’s the key to moving at DevOps speed. The Time Lag Between Dev and QA N-1 sprint is a common approach in which testing activities start at least one sprint behind the development process, and new functionalities are tested only when they become relatively stable. For many automation testing frameworks like Selenium WebDriver, creating and executing tests takes a considerable amount of time. Therefore, testing new functionality after some degree of product readiness is reasonable. But N-1 sprints also bring about the time lag between testing and developing. That is, QAs often have to wait for one (or even two months) before actually exploring new functionality. And when they have something to play with, they struggle to keep up with the development pace. If we think of it that way, N-1 sprints are more or less the replica of the traditional Waterfall model. Breaking Teams’ Silos With In Sprint Automation To break free from the siloed approach of N-1 sprint automation and bring team collaboration to a new level, meet in-sprint automation. Instead of designating Devs and QAs into different sprints, in-sprint automation needles the core functions and engages the entire testing process (creation, implementation, execution, and reporting) all together in one sprint. This one-sprint window brings forth: In-sprint breaks down the invisible siloes between Dev and Ops and ensures everyone in the team progresses simultaneously. Cross-functional collaboration: In sprint introduces the opportunity to detect and fix bugs earlier in the as the automated tests will be ready at roughly the same time as ‘code complete.’ Only a handful of manual tests should be required. Earlier bug detection: SDLC Test cycles will become significantly shorter, and test coverage can be maximized right from the first build. Shorter release cycles and maximized test coverage: Roadblocks to In Sprint Automation If moving towards Agile and DevOps culture is your goal, shifting from N-1 sprint to in-sprint automation is one first step to get there. However, on the path to in-sprint automation, your team might encounter some roadblocks, one of which is handling . last-minute changes in test requirements In Agile teams, testers can use Acceptance Criteria as test requirements. Acceptance Criteria are part of a user story—a brief explanation of the customer-relevant functionality. However, the initial understanding of users and software in development might be incomplete. That’s why when teams learn something new about their users, product owners, developers, and other members get together to discuss and “upgrade” the existing user stories. Those upgrades might lead to test requirements being changed at the very last minute. And testers are left with two options: modifying test cases or starting from scratch. As discussed earlier, creating and running test cases for many testing frameworks is not an express delivery service, and the whole process might take as long as one to two weeks. And it’s not entirely due to the lack of technical expertise, either. Programming background and experience might play a role in modifying test cases within time constraints. But that tactic won’t compensate for the in any given tool or framework. bulky test creation and execution process So suppose teams use frameworks like Selenium WebDriver anyway. Chances are, they will eventually have to discard the entire testing progress of user stories and carry them over to the next sprint. What happens next? Their confidence wanes out over time; testing falls far behind the development pace; they have to circle back to N-1 sprints eventually. Admittedly, in sprint automation is not a one-size-fits-all solution, especially for teams with bulky and inflexible frameworks. Going Fast and Lightweight With Katalon Recorder To avoid those roadblocks to in-sprint automation, besides team skills and collaboration, finding a suitable automation solution should be your next action item. As a robust automated testing solution, Katalon Recorder provides a fast and lightweight option to achieve in-sprint automation: Katalon Recorder supports script-less and fast automation with Record and Playback so that teams can start testing right away and progress in parallel with the development pace. Low-code automation: Advanced features like Self-healing, Global Variables, and Dynamic Test Suites help testers reduce the time, effort, and risks to shorten their test cycles and maximize test coverage. Shorter release cycles: Thanks to its built-in test orchestration platform – – Recorder provides quick test reporting and analytics for better communication and cross-team collaboration. Cross-functional collaboration: Katalon TestOps Recorder enables flexible test exporting options to other popular frameworks like Katalon Studio or Selenium WebDriver. Users can also execute imported tests with minimal effort as Recorder is also compatible with popular programming languages like C#, Java, Ruby, Robot Framework, etc. Scalable pathways: Start In-sprint on a Good Note To achieve in sprint automation, we have to take into consideration many factors, and picking a suitable test automation framework is among the most critical ones. In sprint automation might not be an easy call, but the benefits will be well worth the hardships.

Keep

Learn more

In-Sprint Automation: How to Increase Software Testing Speed

Interactive voice response (IVR) systems let callers access information and find contacts via a menu of prerecorded messages, without having to speak to a human. Callers can respond to prompts via Touch-Tone keypad presses or speech recognition. IVR systems can handle larger call volumes than operators and reduce costs associated with customer service. Plivo, a cloud communications platform and a popular , provides a software tool that lets you build IVR menus through a graphical user interface. PHLO (Plivo High Level Objects) lets you click on components, drag them to a canvas, and customize them with a few clicks. alternative to Twilio Create a PHLO to build a virtual assistant To set up a PHLO for an IVR system, you need a Plivo account, which you can create for free. To create the PHLO, visit the PHLO page of the Plivo console. If this is your first PHLO, the PHLO page will be empty. Click . CREATE NEW PHLO In the “Choose your use case” pop-up, click . The PHLO canvas will appear and show the Start node, which is the starting point of any PHLO. It lets you trigger a PHLO via one of three actions: incoming SMS message, incoming call (which we’ll use), or API request. Build my own Click the node to open the Configuration tab, then enter information that other nodes can retrieve in the API Request section — in this case, the From and optionally To numbers for the IVR system. Start From the list of components on the left side, drag and drop the component onto the canvas. When a component is placed on the canvas it becomes a node. IVR Menu Draw a line to connect the Start node‘s Incoming Call trigger state to the IVR Menu node. In the Configuration tab at the right of the canvas, configure the choices for the IVR menu. For this example, select 1 and 2 as allowed choices. Enter a message to play to the user in the Speak Text box. Once you’ve configured the node, save the configuration by clicking . Do the same for each node as you go along. Validate Drag and drop two instances of the component onto the canvas. Rename them Connect_to_Support and Connect_to_Sales. Draw lines to connect the IVR Menu node‘s 1 and 2 trigger states to the new nodes. Call Forward Configure each node to select the From number using a variable. PHLO will get the number from the key/value pairs set in the Start node. Start typing two braces (curly brackets) to view all available variables, and choose the appropriate one. For the To number, either enter a fixed number directly into the To field or use a variable that you configured in the Start node. Call Forward Drag and drop two instances of the component onto the canvas. Rename the two nodes No_Input_Prompt and Invalid_Input_Prompt and configure each to speak a fixed message for callers to hear when they enter no input or invalid input. Draw lines from the IVR Menu node‘s No Input and Wrong Input trigger states to the respective nodes, then draw lines from the Prompt Completed trigger states of the new nodes back to the IVR Menu node, to give callers another chance to enter a menu choice. Play Audio Give the PHLO a name by clicking in the upper left, then click . Save Your complete PHLO should look like this. Assign the PHLO to a Plivo number Once you‘ve created and configured your PHLO, you have to assign it to a phone number. On the Numbers page of the console, under Your Numbers, click the phone number you want to use for the PHLO. In the Number Configuration box, select PHLO from the Application Type drop-down. From the PHLO Name drop-down, select the PHLO you want to use with the phone number, then click . Update Number Test You can now call your Plivo phone number and see how your IVR system works. Once your basic menu is working, you can add as many choices and levels to your IVR system as you like. For more information about creating a PHLO application, see Plivo’s . PHLO Getting Started guide

Plivo

You can also email us at community@plivo.com

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Api

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Automation

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Business

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Software

2022 - No No No Nodejs

Nominated for 2022 - No No No Nodejs

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Api

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Software

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Business

Nominated for 2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Automation

A No-Code DIY: Setting Up an IVR Virtual Assistant

Pricing localization is a strategy where you present the price of your SaaS differently depending on where the customer lives. You may also hear it referred to as multi-currency pricing or localized pricing. If I asked you how much a house cost, could you give me an answer? The answer is likely no because there’s no such thing as a universal price, even for an identical house. You’ve heard it before—location, location, location. A similar property has a different price tag in Toronto, Paris, São Paulo, Cairo, Seoul, and Bangalore. The same could also be true for your SaaS business. In our , we detail the importance of SaaS pricing and how to get it right for your audience. We also shared that revisiting your monetization strategy is an essential part of growing your business. While some companies might want to stick with the rates that work right now, there may come the point where you can’t rely on growing your market share at the same rate as your company’s early days. B2B SaaS Pricing Masterclass One way your pricing can change as your company evolves is by using multi-currency pricing. Here’s what you need to know about SaaS pricing localization. What is pricing localization? Pricing localization is a strategy where you present the price of your SaaS differently depending on where the customer lives. You may also hear it referred to as multi-currency pricing or localized pricing. Even the simplest pricing localization method requires new workflows and considerations, so it’s understandable if you’re apprehensive about jumping in feet first. Here are some of the benefits of SaaS pricing localization that can make the transition worthwhile: Potential customers may feel more comfortable when they browse your pricing page and see their local currency Optimizing pricing for different countries could help you grow your market share in a region Experimenting with localized pricing lets you find the ideal strategy for each country and increase revenue 2 types of pricing localization Not all pricing localization strategies are created equally. There are two to choose from, and they each come with their benefits and challenges. Change your display currency The first and most straightforward type of pricing localization is where you only change the currency shown. This localization strategy is also called “cosmetic” localization. When you use this strategy, customers avoid any sticker shock at checkout or after payment since they see the price they’ll pay upfront. Having local pricing also makes it easier for potential customers to imagine the cost in their budget without mental math for the exchange rate. For example, shows pricing in local currency for select countries. The America pricing page has plans starting at $99 while French browsers see prices from €99. In this scenario, the pricing strategy is the same, and the only variable is the currency that customers see and use. Hotjar The benefit of cosmetic pricing localization is how simple it is to implement. There’s no need to adjust your pricing strategy or tiers—simply update the currency based on the person’s location. This pricing localization strategy works best when the exchange rate and cost of living between the base currency and display currency are similar. Change your product cost The second type of SaaS pricing localization is more strategic than a simple cosmetic change in currency. Instead, you can customize your pricing based on your customer’s cost of living and purchasing power and have “true” localization. A country or region with a higher cost of living or exchange rate closer to your home currency has a similar or identical price to home. A country with a lower cost of living or buying power pays a proportionally smaller price. Netflix uses a true pricing localization strategy to the fullest extent, with special pricing for . Monthly pricing varies by location and is either displayed in local currency or USD. If you ever wondered what Netflix costs in Japan, Afghanistan, Swaziland, you can . many of the 190 countries it serves browse pricing here Wondering how SaaS companies come up with these local prices? While we don’t have the inside scoop on Netflix’s exact pricing strategy, you can use the . Yes, that’s the real name. The Economist compares the price of a Big Mac across the world using the same base currency, like USD. You can to compare pricing using your base currency. Big Mac Index use this tool Here’s an example. Imagine your entry-level plan is $10 a month USD, and you want to localize to Russia. If you use the proportion for the current Big Mac Index ($5.67 in the US vs. $2.20 in Russia), you would divide your base price by 2.5 (the Big Mac ratio) for a Russia-localized price of $4 a month USD. While customizing your SaaS pricing based on the cost of living is more work than changing the display currency, it could be the way to go for some regions. If you want to expand to markets with very different economics than your own (whether they have more or less purchasing power), true pricing localization makes you a more accessible option. Pricing localization may even give you a competitive advantage if you’re the only option doing it. Though it might be hard to quantify, it’s also possible that customizing a sales page to a person’s location could feel more personal. How to decide when to use localized pricing for your SaaS If you’ve read this far, chances are you’re curious about trying SaaS pricing localization on for size. Here are a few questions to ask yourself to see if it’s time to experiment with multi-currency pricing. If pricing plays a critical role in your positioning Before you start changing your pricing, you need to think about your customers in each region. For subscription apps like Headspace, a global audience is part of their growth ambition. , former Product Marketing Lead at Headspace and how it aligns with their goals of bringing mental health to the world. Cristina Poindexter talked about price localization strategies Her recommendation is to begin your pricing localization discussions with positioning. Talking about whether you want to be a premium product or mass-market solution upfront makes every other pricing localization decision easier. If you want to hear more about Headspace’s experience with pricing localization, . this discussion in partnership with Google Play is worth watching If you’re at a stage where you want to appeal to as many SMBs as possible, then a competitively low price could be ideal. In that case, true pricing localization that makes your cost attainable in your target countries could be the way to go. On the other hand, there can be such a thing as a “too low” price for enterprise customers if it makes them feel that you can’t handle their scale. If a higher price is essential for positioning, a less complicated cosmetic localization strategy offers easier customization. It’s also worth noting that it’s easier to lower existing prices than raise them, so experimenting with higher prices is worth exploring. If you have (or want) a global audience Until you have a solid pricing strategy at home, you likely don’t need to sweat the small details of global pricing localization. Earlier stage companies that focus on capturing more of their existing potential TAM (total addressable market) in one country or region can skip pricing localization for now. If you want to grow in a specific country or notice more and more customers from a region, then you can consider localized pricing. When in May of 2021, , founder of , commented on how the change would benefit global creators. Stephen shared that, “the hope [with localized pricing] would be that this ultimately makes it possible for MORE creators to make revenue on Twitch and more fans supporting their fav creators.” Twitch announced localized pricing Stephen Ellis Pipeline If conversion rates are much lower for a country or region Maybe you’re here because you’ve realized that as hard as you’re trying to break into a new market, you just aren’t gaining the traction you’d like to see. It’s possible that pricing could be to blame, particularly if it’s a country with a vastly different cost of living. Pricing alone isn’t necessarily the culprit, but something to experiment with. Trying price localization could also help if you want to grow in a region where you’re nearing the ceiling of the total addressable market. Rather than adding new customers at the same rate as you used to, you could try customizing pricing to reach your revenue goals. ChartMogul can help you understand your customers and where they are hailing from and answer questions like: Which regions or countries have the highest Average Revenue Per Account? Where is churn most prominent? What to expect when you take on multi-currency pricing Your wheels are turning now, and you think you want to pitch the idea of pricing localization to your team. The only problem? It’s going to be a team effort. Implementing a new and variable pricing strategy comes with many moving parts, and everyone has a role. Your marketing team needs to manage positioning Questions about the impact of pricing on your positioning will likely go to the marketing team. They’ll need to research the market you want to enter (or optimize) and understand how pricing affects decisions. Questions for your marketing team to explore: How are competitors pricing their tiers in the country? What do buyers in this country look for in a SaaS? Does our messaging need to change alongside the pricing update? Your product team needs to customize displays by location If your website is currently the same wherever you access it, some updates to the pricing page are necessary. The simplest route would be creating a guide where people can browse pricing by country . To make it seamless, though, you’ll probably want your pricing page to update based on a person’s location. , as Netflix has Questions for your product team to explore: How many versions of the pricing page will we need? How will we update pricing based on location? Does pricing localization also impact other steps in the checkout and billing process? Your finance team needs to manage multi-currency invoices Unsurprisingly, your finance team will probably have the most adjustments to handle when switching to localized pricing. While you’ll still manage your accounting in your home currency, things like invoices and typical payments will vary between customers. Questions for your finance team to explore: How will we manage multi-currency invoices, contracts, revenues, and payments? What tools will help us manage conversions between currencies? Are there any tax or accounting implications to managing multiple currencies and countries? Your sales team needs to monitor fluctuating MRR In ChartMogul, you can set your primary currency, whether it is EUR, USD, or the currency where your business is headquartered. When ChartMogul comes across an invoice that is billed in a different currency, it will automatically convert the MRR amount to your account’s primary currency. Your ‘Primary currency’ is the currency in which your revenue is reported in your ChartMogul account. We found that this is the most common and useful way in order to track subscription metics. If your global customers pay different amounts, our projections and reporting will vary. Even if you go the simpler route of “cosmetic” localization, you still need to manage exchange rates. This means that metrics like your MRR will fluctuate, even if there aren’t actual changes in accounts. Questions for your sales team to explore: How will we adjust reporting and analysis to account for exchange rate fluctuations? Do we need separate goals and benchmarks for each region? How do we expect pricing to impact close rates? ChartMogul helps you manage global subscriptions You can’t manage what you don’t measure, but luckily for your teams, ChartMogul makes it easy to monitor global subscriptions. Our subscription analytics platform helps you measure, understand, and grow your recurring revenue. There are also features to help you manage exchange rates, so you have an accurate view of MRR and change your base currency at any time.

Alongside

ChartMogul

Netflix

SaaS Pricing Localization: How to Do It the Right Way

We all sometimes try taking on more significant tasks than we can deliver on—it stems directly from our human inability to evaluate complex tasks correctly. Let’s look at how you can address this in your IT journey. Iterate Moving in small, manageable steps is a cornerstone in many common methodologies in our industry: Agile – is all about iterating with the changes to the product to discover what customers need, whereas Minimum Viable Product (MVP) – aims to create the first version that can be checked against the market, and then it’s iterated from there. Let’s see how to use a similar approach in your day-to-day life. While learning The best idea would be to: learn a piece of material, and then use it. The working material will regularly present you with challenges to apply and test your knowledge in a well-organized course or book. If you learn without such a luxury, you will need to create those exercises for yourself. In both cases, the best feedback you can get is your code is working as expected—so you should either use what you’re learning from your side project or start a new one. While working on a ticket Do you often get stuck on a ticket? Chances are, you are trying to do too many things simultaneously. Usually, you can break a task into: refactoring the code you’re about to work on adding code infrastructure—helper methods, updating types, etc. making the changes to the application logic adding end-to-end tests for the new feature In most cases, it’s better to do each part in a separate commit: you don’t want to review or revert refactorings with a new implementation. Splitting things into separate commits, and maybe even pull requests, allows you to get a review on your code quicker, thus speeding up your progress. What should you do if you don’t know the code well enough to plan your actions ahead of time, or you simply forgot and have all changes done simultaneously? No worries, the knowledge you gained during the first attempt won’t go to waste—now, you can take a step back, start a new branch, and apply or redo some part of the big commit you started. While doing projects No matter if you work on commercial projects or on open source—you hear the same mantra everywhere: “Release early, release often.” “Move fast and break things.” Even if you’re working on some personal learning project, you can apply this mindset. Instead of planning a big, final version of your project, try simplifying what you are building to a complete minimum. You can find some examples in my article . about learning with personal projects Avoid falling down a rabbit hole Your main goal with doing things in iterations is to avoid falling into a rabbit hole. It’s good to spend time investigating stuff; and as a developer, you need to be resilient to the frustration of not knowing how something works or how to fix a bug. The bad thing is that the same strength in the face of frustration sometimes works against you. At some point, the returns on investment of spending more time diminish to the point where you’re only wasting your time. You will be deep in the issue and already invested in fixing it when it happens, so letting it go will not be easy. Let’s see how you can avoid these traps! You are not alone In most cases, you are not working alone: there are other people around who can help you out. As a beginner, you have two potential modes of failure: seeking help too fast seeking help too late What is too late or too fast, you ask? Well, that depends on the situation your team is in. I can easily imagine two extremes: your team is under a lot of pressure—an emergency of some sort, so no experienced developer is available to help out you are taking over from a developer who’s leaving in 2 weeks, so the priority is to get as knowledge from them as possible My advice is to figure out explicit rules with your team and then stick to them. So, if you agree that four hours of hitting your head against a wall on a ticket is too much, then after four hours, you look for help. Learn how to call it quits It's not any better of an idea just because you spent so many hours implementing it. If anything, you proved the approach is not feasible or not as easy as expected. Avoid the sunk cost fallacy: the excellent strategy is to estimate before starting how long you want to spend on a task before leaving it behind, and then sticking to that estimate. Depending on the ticket, dropping it can mean letting another developer pick it up or not doing it all together, at least right now. Always look for feedback Every step of the interaction is a point where we can and should get feedback. It will allow us to make some course corrections and make sure we’re on the right track. There are plenty of feedback types we could look for: automated tests passing locally or on CI more experienced colleague or your mentor reviewing the code presenting our product externally and collecting feedback Want to learn more? Check out my other HackerNoon stories: https://hackernoon.com/u/marcinwosinek

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Beginners Guide

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Code Quality

2022 - HackerNoon Contributor of the Year - Learning

Newsletter

Senior JS developer

One Small Step for You, One Big Step for Your IT Career

Maker

Instagram

Subscribe to the Hacker Noon Podcast

How to Recover from the Log4j Supply Chain Attack with Ilkka Turunen

Finding a technical co-founder is one of the biggest challenges faced by startup founders. Here’s how Audapio’s Founder Dudley Gould overcame this common startup hurdle. I started my entrepreneurial journey like most first-time founders. I had a great idea, with the industry knowledge to turn it into a business vision. But I had no idea how to actually bring it to life. No experience. Limited technical expertise. And no co-founders. I was convinced I needed a technical co-founder, that dream partner who could help turn my vision into a product. So I started looking for them. I went to meetups. Reached out to friends and friends of friends. Reached out to ex-colleagues. Joined online groups. You name it, I tried it. The days quickly turned into weeks. The weeks started going by quicker and quicker and I felt like I was going nowhere. So I made a decision. Arguably one of the most important ones in the early stages of Audapio. But more on that in a bit. First, let me start by expanding on the idea behind Audapio. The Idea Whilst I worked in audit, I spent far too much time, re-keying data, searching for paper, and only testing samples of transactions. None more so, than when working with bank statements. Auditors work with bank statements every day. These come in various PDF, paper or CSV forms, all of which are a pain to work with. It would take a long time to go through every transaction in the bank, especially if you’re dealing with paper, so auditors pick samples. This means that auditors often only look at about 1% of transactions! But these outdated practices are not only inefficient, they can also lead to . vital audit evidence being completely missed Having worked in audit, I knew that Open Banking could bring new opportunities and completely transform the way auditors work with their clients’ bank statements. Just have a look at the to see some of the opportunities that Open Banking has enabled. Open Banking App Store My idea was to use open banking to provide auditors with secure, real-time access to client bank statements directly from the bank. Not only is this much easier for auditors to work with but it also gives auditors the much-needed assurance that they are working with complete and accurate bank statements. This alone would have prevented the recent Wirecard audit failure . But most importantly, we’re leveraging robotic process automation (RPA) and providing advanced analytics and dashboards. This gives auditors a complete picture of what goes through their clients’ banks in real-time. The Search for a Technical Co-Founder So, I started my search by going to as many networking events and meetups as I could. From DevOps to Open Banking to generic tech events I tried them all. Some were good. Others I went to and I didn’t talk to a single person. And whilst I learned a lot about Open Banking and met some interesting people at the meetups, I didn’t find a technical co-founder. I didn’t even come close. I also went through my contacts to see if anyone I knew could help me out. Friends, friends of friends, colleagues of friends, I reached out to a lot of people. Bingo, I thought I’d found my technical co-founder. A good friend of a friend with the six years of development experience I’d been told my co-founder needed. We started working together for a few months. However, he was incredibly busy with his job and didn’t have a lot of time to help me build a startup. Some days he was getting up at four in the morning to do a couple of hours of development before starting work. But naturally, that’s not sustainable and progress was slow. Eventually, when I wanted him to quit his job and come on board as co-founder, he was honest and said the timing wasn’t right for him. Which was completely understandable. Giving up a good salary and job he liked to take on the risks associated with trying to build a startup is not something many people are prepared to do. I appreciated his honesty. He did, however, put me in touch with a couple of friends of his who he thought might be interested. But again, after various meetings with them, it never worked out. Time was rushing by and my product wasn’t any closer to being built. So I started researching other options. Changing Tactics It was clear my search for a technical co-founder wasn’t bearing any fruit. So I decided to explore the option of working with a custom software development company. A friend of mine put me in touch with a software development company in London that he was working with. But naturally, them being a top agency in central London meant that they were too expensive. So I decided to search for other top software development companies outside of London, broadening my search to European agencies. These companies offer the same quality assurances at a much more competitive rate. “In total, I reached out to around 15 agencies, had meetings with 10 and whittled the list down to the top two.” One agency was based in Estonia and the other, Altar.io, in Lisbon. I decided to go with Altar.io based on a mix of: Gut feeling A past project they had worked on in the Open Banking space The fact that they had worked with the likes of McKinsey and IMB – as well as various fintech startups. I was just about to pull the trigger and sign the contract when I was approached by another early-stage startup. They offered to build my product for an equity stake. The team was very experienced, and this opportunity felt too good to turn down. We worked together for three months and had a great relationship. But then, our lawyers flagged a potential problem.  Taking an equity stake, potentially, meant both companies losing any SEIS/EIS tax relief (tax relief for investors who invest in early-stage startups), not something either could afford to lose. We explored other options including merging the two startups, but we didn’t come to an agreement. Ultimately, it would’ve meant me giving up the dream of starting my own business, and being an employee again. I had to walk away. I was back to square one. So, I got back in touch with Daniel at Altar.io and told him what happened. 10 minutes later, I had booked my flights to Lisbon. Testing the Waters with Altar.io My initial commitment was fairly small as I signed up to a . I flew to Lisbon to spend a week with the team at Altar.io in their offices. Product Scope I remember arriving at their offices in Lisbon and my first thought was “thank goodness, they exist”. actually The Product Scope was an intensive 5-day structured process. It started with an immersive focus session with the team to dive into the product vision from a business standpoint. From there, we created the user stories for the design of the Minimum Viable Product. I was very impatient and excited to get started. I remember sitting down to do the Product Scope; the last thing I wanted to do was start from the beginning again. But it allowed us to all get on the same page and clearly define the business case. For me, the Product Scope was less about brand new, magical, ideas surrounding my product. But it allowed me to fly back to London with confidence, knowing I’d met the team that was going to build my MVP. Related: How to Build a Successful Minimum Viable Product (MVP) in 3 Steps I’d sat down with Daniel and aligned my vision with him and we’d made some great decisions about the product. Expert Tip “The key decision point around hiring an agency is how quickly you need to get to market and what your financial resources are. Remember, outsourcing has been used by many very successful companies to develop their MVP, such as Slack, which is valued at $3.8bn, Skype which sold to Microsoft for $8.5bn, as well as BaseCamp and Github.” Judy Robinett, startup expert and best-selling author of Crack The Funding Code Going All-In Then I opted to move on to the software development stage. I was finally about to start building my MVP. And then the first bump in the road appeared. From the information provided by the Product Scope, the team realised the budget estimate was too low. But instead of just telling me “tough, the price has gone up” Altar.io gave me three options: Make adjustments to the MVP to keep it at the same price Do it the original way, which would cost a lot more than estimated Find a middle ground where it would cost slightly more, but keeps some of the features I wanted from the original way. So even though the pricing wasn’t as I originally expected, I appreciated their willingness to be transparent and provide some options. “Trust plays a huge part in working with an agency. You can’t watch what they are doing, and even if you could, you wouldn’t necessarily fully understand it anyway.” You have to work with an agency otherwise, making decisions becomes impossible. you can trust That same trust has to work both ways. For the team to put the maximum effort into building a startup MVP they want to know there’s a good shot at it succeeding. I’ve been lucky that Altar.io have backed me all the way. “On paper, it’s an agency relationship, but in reality, the business will only work if you act as one team. If you don’t the project will fail.” It’s definitely not always plain sailing. Along the way, there have been changes in the estimated time and budget for various features. I was also inexperienced and not aware of how big a part bug fixing plays in software development. Initially, a lot of our communication was quite ad hoc, no formal check-ins/updates – which was a bit messy. There were some teething issues, nothing major, but enough to make me nervous. I had to go with the flow, I didn’t want to push too much, because I also felt that Altar.io were taking a bit of a risk on me and believing in my product. So I trusted them and believed in the fact they know what they’re doing. Not Just a Team of Developers When I started working with Altar.io I thought I’d found a team of developers. But in the first few weeks, I learnt that actually, my biggest asset was Daniel, Head of Product. He , making sure the user experience was always seamless. challenged me on every decision Expert Tip “By allowing yourself to be challenged you will become wiser throughout your business journey. You will have a clearer idea of where to invest your time & money – thanks, in part, to that outside eye. After all, if you are talking to an experienced agency they have probably faced many of the pitfalls and mistakes you are likely to encounter.” Paolo Dotta, Co-Founder Altar.io In fact, even on my first call with Altar.io, Daniel spent two hours challenging me. He wanted to understand how strong the value proposition was and whether I had the resources, experience and network required to make it a success. There’s always something Daniel thinks of that would never have crossed my mind. His experience developing dozens of products for the likes of McKinsey and various asset managers and MVPs for entrepreneurs is invaluable. Altar.io is the seventh startup Daniel has built. So he has a lot of advice to offer and a lot of experience on the business development side. And then there’s Rui. Starting Audapio has taught me that building a startup is not just about finding a problem and creating a solution. There are hundreds of problems and solutions out there waiting to be tackled. The real challenge to building an MVP  is marketing. To me, I’m building something that is obvious. Changing the way people work with bank statements from sampling transactions from Paper, CSV or PDFs to testing 100% of transactions on a secure digital platform. But working out how to and, more importantly, how to quickly, simply and effectively explain the value to potential customers is not as easy! find and approach your target market “Ask any successful business founder what their biggest challenge was. I’m sure 9 times out of 10 it’s marketing-related!” Rui is Altar.io’s Head of Marketing. He has a lot of experience and knowledge and loves to share it. We’ve ended up having fortnightly calls to catch up and discuss all things marketing and I’ve learned a huge amount from him. So I think it’s fair to say that with Altar.io: “I’ve not just found a team of developers, I very much feel that I have an extended team of co-founders.” Just instead of giving them equity, it’s cash. Should You Hold Out Until You Find A Technical Co-Founder I still really like the classic idea of finding a technical co-founder. Someone that shares your passion, commitment and responsibility, and is equally experienced, just on the tech-side. And if you’re looking for one, you should from the team at Altar.io. read this But whether or not that’s a better option, I couldn’t say for sure. I think it would make a lot of things easier. Building an MVP with an agency can be costly, and there is often the perception that solo founders working with agencies are a bad bet. “But the reality is, finding that dream technical co-founder is so hard.” As I mentioned earlier, I was: Going to random tech meetups approaching people to make connections Reaching out through my contacts to find someone who could help Going through my LinkedIn connections to see if I knew someone who knew someone Signing up to various websites I’m glad I spent the time I did trying to find that perfect technical co-founder. A couple of times I even tried to convince myself I’d found them – as many founders do. But at the end of the day, no one I met had the perfect combination of skills, passion and willingness to leave their job to join me. I wouldn’t hesitate to use an agency if you can’t find a technical co-founder. Just . make sure it’s the right agency Expert Tip “Outsource the job to be done. Not the reason it needs to be done nor the ownership of what needs to be done; outsource the skills and work in the same manner that you’d hire the best resources for any job” Paul O’Brien, Founder of MediaTech Ventures Final Thoughts Expect more than a few bumps along the way and prepare to be persistent. You’ll make mistakes, people around you will make mistakes and everything takes longer than you would expect (this bothers me still today). Ultimately, the secret to surviving the roller coaster is surrounding yourself with people you can trust. People who believe in your idea as much as you do. Regardless of whether it’s a technical co-founder, CTO or an agency. Focus on finding the right fit for you and go for it. This article was originally published here by Dudley Gould

HackerNoon Tech Stories Archive March 16th, 2022

What It Feels Like to Close Two Marketing Campaigns on the Same Day

@ellens
Ellen Stevens

Social Media Networks are Coming to the Blockchain

@emmanuelawosika
Emmanuel Awosika

Web 3.0 and the Metaverse Walk Into a Bar...

@julieplavnik
Julie Plavnik

Will the U.S. Government do Anything About Mortgage Rate Discrimination?

@TheMarkup
The Markup

Explore Different Ways You Can Use Data Visualization to Help Your Nonprofit

@techsoup
TechSoup

SOLID Principles in JavaScript: What Does the "L" Stand For?

@serhiirubets
Serhii Rubets

What's the Best Motivation Strategy?

@saragpinto
Sara Pinto

What Celebrity Patronage Means For Web3 and the Metaverse

@mashacryptoprlab
Masha Prusso

How to Become the Greatest Leader of All Time: Tom Brady Style

@lomitpatel
Lomit Patel

In-Sprint Automation: How to Increase Software Testing Speed

@katalon
Katalon

A No-Code DIY: Setting Up an IVR Virtual Assistant

@plivo
Plivo

SaaS Pricing Localization: How to Do It the Right Way

@chartmogul
ChartMogul

One Small Step for You, One Big Step for Your IT Career

@marcinwosinek
Marcin Wosinek

How to Recover from the Log4j Supply Chain Attack with Ilkka Turunen

@podcast
Podcast

Building a Tech Startup Without a Technical Co-Founder

@rui-lourenco
Rui Lourenço

Founder Story: Lessons From Over 25 Years in Silicon Valley

@rui-lourenco
Rui Lourenço

HackerNoon Tech Stories Archive March 16th, 2022

@ellensEllen Stevens

@emmanuelawosikaEmmanuel Awosika

@julieplavnikJulie Plavnik

@TheMarkupThe Markup

@techsoupTechSoup

@serhiirubetsSerhii Rubets

@saragpintoSara Pinto

@mashacryptoprlabMasha Prusso

@lomitpatelLomit Patel

@katalonKatalon

@plivoPlivo

@chartmogulChartMogul

@marcinwosinekMarcin Wosinek

@podcastPodcast

@rui-lourencoRui Lourenço

@rui-lourencoRui Lourenço

@ellens
Ellen Stevens

@emmanuelawosika
Emmanuel Awosika

@julieplavnik
Julie Plavnik

@TheMarkup
The Markup

@techsoup
TechSoup

@serhiirubets
Serhii Rubets

@saragpinto
Sara Pinto

@mashacryptoprlab
Masha Prusso

@lomitpatel
Lomit Patel

@katalon
Katalon

@plivo
Plivo

@chartmogul
ChartMogul

@marcinwosinek
Marcin Wosinek

@podcast
Podcast

@rui-lourenco
Rui Lourenço

@rui-lourenco
Rui Lourenço