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raw-output · 5 years

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20 Years.

Two-thirds of a lifetime ago, a ten-year-old boy in a scratchy wool sweater sat huddled under an old down blanket. The first proper snow of the season had come the week before, and the boy hadn’t been dressed for building forts. Now here he was - bored, sick and sweaty. His mother entered the room with a mug of undrinkably hot milk with honey and butter. In her other hand was an issue of GAME.EXE, a computer gaming magazine. The words “HALF-LIFE” were plastered across the bottom of the cover. The boy loved reading, and loved computers, and the milk needed time to cool off anyway. He opened the magazine and flipped to page 8 after finding it in the table of contents. The boy grew older and switched languages, countries and continents, but his favorite game never changed.

It’s hard to compress two decades into text, but I will attempt to do so when it comes to my relationship with the Half-Life series that began all those years ago, with that preview article in that magazine.

The article was written in a second-person perspective that really stuck out to me, and was filled with screenshots that would later turn out to be of an unreleased rough beta version of the game. It ran through several dramatized, episodic descriptions of events in the game, then listed out the weapons used in the game, the enemies you would face and the tactics to deal with them. Finally, there was an interview with Marc Laidlaw himself. This single article was sufficient to make me completely insufferable to my parents for the next few months. “I want to play Half-Life,” I would say. At first, this meant asking to go to an Internet cafe a few blocks away from home, and for money to pay by the hour and use one of their beefy gaming PCs. Later on, it meant asking for a copy of the game, and for time on the “main” home computer - the only machine that could run the game at all, in glorious 320x240 resolution that gave me headaches.

A couple of years passed. The move to the US threw everything into a pleasant state of disarray, but the one thing that hadn’t changed was having to ask my parents to use the computer to play Half-Life. I had found one of my own soon after arriving in the States, but it had no sound card. It was there, on my mother’s computer, that I finally beat the game. My thirteenth birthday present was a copy of the newly released Opposing Force expansion. My birthday cake featured an edible photo of myself playing in a fountain in downtown Chicago, which my mother doodled over with brightly colored frosting. I was now knee-deep in toxic green sludge, a crowbar in one hand, and a proud Lambda logo on my chest.

Most kids in my 8th and 9th grade classes didn’t share my enthusiasm for Half-Life. They played console games and were rightfully hyped about the Playstation 2 and X-Box. In search of like-minded people, I took to the Internet. My options for getting online in 2001 were limited to libraries - either during lunch at school, or at the Naperville Public Library, which was a hour-long walk from home. I discovered Planet Half-Life, an offshoot of the Gamespy network. Through it, I discovered the fact that my favorite game was designed from the ground up to be moddable. I learned of Counter-Strike, Team Fortress Classic, and Sven Co-op. I discovered the Handy Vandal’s Almanac and The Snarkpit, two communities focused on level design. Having no reliable internet at home, I downloaded the level editor - then called Worldcraft - onto a floppy drive and brought it home to install. For the first time, I wasn’t simply playing the game. My parents looked on as I worked to figure out the obtuse user interface, trying to remember what I’d read earlier in the day. They raised their eyebrows when I finally managed to compile and run my first level - a hollow, unlit concrete box 512 units across with a single prefab trashcan hovering in the center. There wasn’t much more I could do in the limited time I was allowed to use the good computer, but I had caught the bug. My notebooks were filled with doodles of level layouts, my mind filled with cheesy storylines to match.

Eventually my family moved to a house with proper internet access, and I got a set of hardware with enough power under the hood to run both the game and the editor. It could even produce sound! All the things I could only read and salivate about were now within my reach, and I gorged myself on them. Counter-Strike quickly fell by the wayside, but Team Fortress and Sven Co-Op did not. Natural Selection came out and blew me away with how different a Half-Life mod could look and feel from the original game. I stayed up past midnight, playing, building, and playing some more. I learned that projects can die - when the extremely tongue-in-cheek Scientist Slaughterhouse mod went silent.

The release of the Half-Life 2 trailer took everybody by surprise. I had called one of my like-minded friends and we synch-watched it together, pausing every few minutes to let the video buffer and gush about how amazing everything looked and how much we were looking forward to messing with the modding toolkit. The subsequent beta leak and resulting delays taught me to be patient.

The move to California was not long after, and my patience was immediately put to the test as most of my belongings were stuck with the moving company, including my computer. I must have gone through a full pack of printer paper in less than a month, drawing up concepts and layouts for Xen Rebels, a mod centered around a semi-peaceful human colonization of the realm set after the events of Half-Life. Once my computer arrived, it was right back to the late nights and groggy mornings for me. Our home Internet was bad but workable, and I spent countless hours with the new and more creative mods that were being released, including The Specialists - a strong attempt to recreate the gun-fighting and martial arts stylings of Hong-Kong action movies in a multiplayer game. Around the same time I was introduced to the strange new world of anime, and decided that I simply must change the two throwable knives offered by The Specialists into kunai and throwing needles. This of course required me to learn 3D modelling. At the time, this was done with Milkshape 3D, a model editor compatible with most contemporary game formats. Once again, countless hours of figuring out the interface and the workflow followed, set to the calming tones of the Unreal, Deus Ex and Half-Life soundtracks. Creating models felt a lot more freeform than levels as I wasn’t constrained to a unit grid or forced to use convex geometry, and one day the new throwing weapons were in. I published the modified models on a forum to exactly zero fanfare. Around the same time, I began learning the basics of Photoshop in school, so modelling and texturing went hand in hand. To say my early textures were atrocious would be an affront to honest, hard-working atrocious textures the world over, but I continued my studies. My experience with working in 3D even netted me a 2nd place award at the school art contest - money which I immediately put back into upgrading my computer.

Half-Life 2 came out in November of 2004, to universal praise and celebration. I received the collector’s edition as a present for New Year, along with a copy of Raising The Bar. I beat the game the same morning, without a wink of sleep between unwrapping my present and the final darkness of the credits screen. The SDK didn’t ship with the game, but as soon as it was released I dove in. Soon after, the modding community blossomed, bigger and more vibrant than the original game’s, driven by the incredible flexibility of the engine. One of the first mods that appeared was made by a British man named Garry, and was called simply that, “Garry’s Mod”. It let players interact with the physics engine, and slowly sprouted more and more features. Many players used these features to pose character ragdolls, eventually creating entire comic series with storylines ranging from the comedic non-sequitur to dark and serious. Of course I felt the need to try my hand at it. That lead to the creation of The Plane - the story of Beet, a Combine Elite who managed to break free of his overseers’ indoctrination and find friendship, love, and revenge on his old masters. The only redeeming feature of that story was that it taught me how not to write stories.

I began getting more attached to the Gmod community than the expressly level design one at The Snarkpit. The few levels I publicly released were designed specifically as sandboxes to play and build in. The most popular ones were gm_orbit and rp_bahamut, maps set in space and featuring zero gravity for physical objects, allowing players to build smaller spaceships, or roleplay as the crew of a salvage and exploration vessel. Posting teaser images on the forums taught me a valuable lesson - what it felt like to be the one creating hype, instead of experiencing it. The constant demands were overwhelming. Some would simply want more work-in-progress screenshots. Others would drop ultimatums that unless a certain feature was designed a certain way, they would refuse to use the map. Others yet attempted to worm their way into getting the map early, offering to test it and provide feedback. I had almost deleted each project multiple times before finally releasing it.

Life happened, and things with Half-Life slowed down. When the Orange Box came out in 2006, I attempted to get it at a five-finger discount at a local Target. I got caught. Indirectly thought it was, Half-Life taught me that idiocy often leads to consequences. Buying it legitimately later in the year and playing through Episode Two reminded me that some stories aren’t written to end neatly.

It was in 2007 that I bought a membership for the Something Awful forums, and discovered an avid and very exclusive community of Gmod players. Over the course of the following decade, most of these people remained in constant contact with me, and will probably remain so for the foreseeable future. I became an admin once we opened our serves to the public - moderating the newcomers and mentoring the unskilled. One of the people had a project in mind, and I began creating models again. Miraculously, Milkshape 3D remained compatible with the Source engine, so I worked with it until I learned Maya. This project would eventually become known as Armored Combat Framework, and be released to the Gmod community at large. I learned how to iterate designs based on feedback, and how it felt to work in a well organized team.

Frontier happened around 2010, and was another lesson in teamwork - specifically what happens when things break down without role redundancy. Ambitions ran high, and the hype mounted. The programmer eventually left, and all that remains of the project is the very videos and images that were used to hype it in the first place, and a folder full of now-useless models, maps and textures. That was probably what prompted me to start pulling away from Half-Life and Gmod in general.

Black Mesa came out in 2012 and breathed a new life into my old obsession. I played through the original Half-Life again, then through the remake, noting the differences and the tweaks to make the gameplay more palatable to modern-day players. It felt good, like putting on an old but comfortable jacket. I’d fire up the SDK now and then, mostly to help newer, more driven designers. Two of the guys from Team Frontier went on to work in the industry full-time. There were whispers of a new game in the works, minor leaks of file and folder names hidden away in Valve projects. Episode 3 turned into Half-Life 3. A full sequel, rather than another short episode, as originally planned. “HL3 Confirmed” became a meme, but the people at the top remained silent.

Life kept happening, as it does. I lost people, I found people. I left home. Every now and then I’d fire up HL or BM again, or drop by the old Gmod server. I’d build things and model things, and release none of it to the public. I watched as the Dota International became the most widely spectated event in gaming, making players, sponsors, and Valve millions. The realization slowly started settling in. Then Marc Laidlaw retired, and later posted the Epistle. The workers at Valve spoke of a lack of direction and stagnation that comes with a cornered market. Modding for an engine over a decade old, no matter how advanced, slowed down.

It’s a different world now. Unity and Unreal engines rule the scene. Survival and Battle Royale have become the new buzzwords. Microtransactions. Loot boxes. Streaming integration. Freemium. E-Sports. Mobile gaming. Virtual Reality. If a new Half-Life were to appear today, would it be changed by the zeitgeist, or would it stay the course set by its predecessors? I don’t know. But there’s one thing that the escapades of a mute, bespectacled research associate have taught me more than anything else: hope.

#half-life #anniversary #20 years #textwall #nostalgia

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huntermagazine362 · 3 years

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Notion To Todoist

Notion Vs Todoist

Todoist Integration Office 365

Todoist Notion Integration

Notion Todoist

In a matter of minutes and without a single line of code, Zapier allows you to automatically send info between ClickUp and Todoist. Get started with workflows like: Add new ClickUp tasks to Todoist.Or check out the rest of our guided workflows.Save time with Zapier; it's free to try. Notion calls itself an all-in-one workspace for notes and documents, wikis, tasks and projects, and spreadsheets and databases. Although I still prefer Todoist as my task manager (I wish Todoist and Notion could integrate!), Notion has become my project management software tool. I’ll admit: the learning curve on Notion was a bit rough at first.

Test your Zap and if everything went according to the plan, you should see your email in your notion table. Integration #4: Send Tasks from Todoist/Tasks to Notion. The integration allows you to send tasks from pretty much any Todo app that works with Zapier. Set up a Todo table. Whilst Todoist haven’t totally changed their business model after seeing the rise of Roam, Notion and many more tools – and their expansive set of features, it has created some form of expansion of.

Using modular productivity-boosting solutions such as Notion, Coda, and Airtable may look like a challenge initially. However, you'll gradually figure out the efficient bits while keeping all information and the team in one place. On the other hand, there are proven software like Trello, Asana, and Jira with a single function in mind. If you are confused between Notion and Trello to manage projects and tasks, we'll compare them in this post to help you pick one.

At first glance, both Notion and Trello seem similar. Well, they both let you manage large projects like a pro. But the concept couldn’t have been different.

Notion relies on Project management templates to get started. While Trello follows tried and tested Kanban method to move blocks as the project goes ahead.

In this post, we will compare both Notion and Trello on various factors. The talking points include interface, features, sharing, price, management capabilities, and more. Let’s get started.

Also on Guiding Tech

How to Create a Custom Template in Notion

Cross-Platform Availability

Notion is available on iOS, Android, Mac, Windows, and Web. To provide a seamless experience across platforms, the company uses the same UI on mobile, PC, and web.

My only gripe is Notion mobile apps. Instead of being native, they are essentially web wrappers.

Visit Notion

Trello has the upper hand, for it is available on iOS, Android, macOS, Windows, and Web. It supports all the major browsers too.

Even though both apps are accessible on mobile platforms, the experience is best served on the web.

Visit Trello

User Interface

Notion appears like a broad white canvas. You can add templates to it and start organizing the stuff.

The major options, such as pages and sub-sections, are on the left. The thing about Notion is, it won’t throw every detail at the user. The editing options are available as soon as you use the ‘/‘ command.

Memorizing the useful Notion commands will help you save time later.

On the Trello home screen, you will find boards all the recently viewed and personal boards. You can create a team, add a name, and then integrate relevant board sections related to the project.

You can also change board backgrounds to match the project sentiment and style.

Also on Guiding Tech

Notion vs OneNote: Should You Switch to Notion

Notion Vs Todoist

Project and Task Management

You can make to-do lists on Notion and Trello. That reduces your reliance on constantly moving around lists from other to-do apps such as Todoist or TickTick.

You will have to use templates on Notion. You can find several to-do templates in the Notion Template Gallery, and you can choose one according to your requirements.

Notion’s weekly agenda template is my favorite to manage small projects, and I humbly recommend it to everyone.

You can give it a relevant name, add a cover photo and icon to get started. Now, add tasks below the weekdays, and as a bonus, you can integrate reminder notifications.

Type ‘/remind’ and add the date and time to get notified on mobile or PC.

As for managing huge projects, Notion offers several project management templates. Among them, Roadmap is my favorite one. To me, the Roadmap template is like Trello on steroids.

You can keep track of ongoing projects, add issues, integrate tags, share it with a team member, and more. Not only that, but one can also tap on the tab and see all the details regarding it.

You can add as many suitable table contents as you wish. After that, you need to integrate tags and buttons to get the maximum out of the template.

Trello popularized Kanban-style project management with drag and drop function, and is sticking to its strength by setting it as the default option.

Trello sticks to the basic board view. Based on your requirements, you can give the board a relevant name and set up the whole thing. Here is how I use it.

I have added tasks to assigned, in-going, in-going, in review, and completed tabs for the Product timeline. I tag the tasks to a relevant team member, add details such as image, description, and conversation in the comments menu.

For bug tracking, I have made a separate board that shows the ongoing projects in the company. Below each project, I add app progress issues, tag the team member, add details and screenshot of the bug, and archive it once it's fixed.

That said, Notion can be a bit confusing and overwhelming folks just starting off with it. The process involves finding the right template for you. Trello has more user-friendly process to get started.

Features and Sharing

Trello relies on third-party integration with other apps. They are called power-ups. The list of apps is endless here. It's neatly categorized into sub-sections in the Power-up menu. I'm sure you will stumble upon something you use daily.

Using power-ups, you can add Trello tasks to Google Calendar as well. Trello also feels visually pleasing with minimal efforts.

Todoist Integration Office 365

Notion is can be your ultimate workspace to organize your information and work of your teams. You can build a subscription tracker, finance tool, book tracking page, and more. The possibilities are endless.

As expected, both the software allows you to invite members to a board or workspace. You will find all the member activities in the notification panel.

Pricing

Notion is free for personal use. As for team sharing, you can invite up to 5 users to a team. The paid plans start at $4 per member per month.

Trello offers the premium version called Trello Gold. With $3.75/month, you get access to all the customization features, add files more than 10MB size, and use third-party integration from the other apps.

Also on Guiding Tech

#productivity='bp-purple>

Click here to see our productivity articles page

Pick One Wisely

Both apps offer compelling task and project management capabilities with the help of templates. However, both differ when it comes to execution. For small teams and projects with minimal timeline, I would advise going with Trello. Notion is more suitable for those who want to organize every possible little detail in one place.

Next up:Notion is a joy to use with Keyboard shortcuts. Read the post below to find the top eleven Notion keyboard shortcuts to boost your productivity.

The above article may contain affiliate links which help support Guiding Tech. However, it does not affect our editorial integrity. The content remains unbiased and authentic.

LATEST NEWS ON WINDOWS 11

While Microsoft had promised in 2015 that Windows 10 would be the ultimate version of its famous operating system, the Redmond giant has reversed its decision. After announcing in May 2021 that the next update of the system would be a real small revolution, we now know that behind this update is in fact ... Windows 11 !

Because yes, it is now a certainty: Windows 11 is the name that Microsoft gives to its new operating system. The installation ISO file that recently leaked to the web proves it. By the way, note that Microsoft is also currently waging war on sites that share links to the same ISO file , the editor of Redmond seeing a very bad eye the fact that its OS is already circulating on the Web so that nothing has yet been formalized.

But back to what interests us here: we have listed and analyzed all the new features that we can expect in this edition of the OS. And we have tried to answer the various questions that such a change implies: when will Windows 11 be released? Windows 10 going to disappear? And above all, will the new OS be free like its predecessor for those who already have a license of the old version?

WHAT'S NEW IN WINDOWS 11?

According to Satya Nadella, the current CEO of Microsoft, the next Windows is shaping up to be a big event: “Soon we will be sharing one of the most important Windows updates of the last decade, in order to deliver greater economic opportunities for developers and creators. I have used it for the last few months and am incredibly happy with the next generation of Windows, ”he said in May 2021.

The OS in question is of course Windows 11. Microsoft has not officially communicated on its release, we could remain for the moment at the stage of hypotheses concerning its content. If it is only that a version of Windows 11 has already leaked on the Web and that it allows getting a serious idea of the novelties of the operating system.

A NEW START MENU ON THE AGENDA

If Microsoft has not completely revamped Windows 11 compared to Windows 10, some big changes are still to be noted. Let's start with the Start menu . As shown in the screenshot below, the Windows icon that calls up the Start menu is no longer located on the left end of the Taskbar, but in its center. When you click on it, you immediately notice that the menu “floats” above the Windows icon, while in Windows 10, the menu was attached to it.

The Windows 10 Start menu on the left and the Windows 11 start menu on the right… That changes dramatically, doesn't it?

The icons present in the Start menu are presented in two very distinct categories: the first lists the shortcuts which are “pinned” to find them more quickly (the manipulation was already possible with Windows 10, but these icons were located in the right frame of the Start menu, while in Windows 11, they are located in the top frame). The second section deals with new applications installed or updated, as well as recently viewed files. These icons are located in a box entitled “Our recommendations”.

Pinned icons (in the top frame, therefore) can be removed or moved with a simple right click. As for the shortcuts appearing in the “Our recommendations” list (in the bottom frame, therefore), it is possible to delete them, open their directory in File Explorer, launch them using the browser, etc.

THE TASKBAR IS ALSO GETTING A FACELIFT

Just as it was possible to customize the Windows 10 taskbar in every way, it is possible to completely customize that of Windows 11. But rather than resorting to menus and sub-menus as shown in the screenshot below. Below, Microsoft has decided to do away with the cascading menus and group everything together in a single option. When you click the Settings option on the taskbar , you open the Settings application (which was already the case with Windows 10). From then on, you can completely customize the taskbar.

On the left is the rather “cluttered” Windows 10 customization menu. On the right, that of Windows 10, much easier to understand.

This is not the only novelty of the taskbar. The search field has also disappeared , to make way for an icon (a magnifying glass). There, as in Windows 10, you have access to a window allowing you to search locally or on the Web, to consult the top applications, to launch a specific request in the folders, music, photos, videos, etc. .

Note in passing that the taskbar and its icons can now adopt three different heights , against two for Windows 10. Currently, this change is only possible by adding a value to the registry. For the moment, the Taskbar Settings function no longer allows you to change the size of the icons, but we can bet that Microsoft will soon reintroduce this option to take advantage of the 3 different sizes.

Another interesting novelty: the News and Fields of Interest function , integrated in build 21H1 of Windows 10, is now in the form of a Widget . As a result, Windows 10 no longer constantly displays the temperature on the icon in question. On the other hand, rather than being displayed in a small frame located on the right of the screen, the centers of interest, the sports results, the stock price and the weather are now displayed in a window to the left of the screen. This takes up half the screen and is much more visible (and readable) than the somewhat ridiculous frame, located at the bottom right of Windows 10. Note that the simple fact that Microsoft calls this section “Widgets ”Suggests that

WINDOWS AND ICONS CHANGE THEIR LOOK

When you launch Windows 11 for the first time, you can't help but notice some major interface changes. All windows now have rounded edges. And it doesn't matter whether it's Explorer windows, Settings windows, the News & Interests Widget, or the many apps you may need to install: rounded edges are a must.

The icons Windows benefit from a helping youth. We had already been able to get a glimpse of it through a preview of Windows 10, it is now in effect for Windows 11. File Explorer thus benefits from new icons, as shown in the screenshot above.

WINDOWS CAN NOW BE POSITIONED MORE EASILY

Until now, when you wanted to rearrange all windows on the Windows desktop, you had to right-click on the taskbar, and select one of the following options: Cascade, Show stacked windows, Show side-by-side windows, or View Desktop. This era is now over since, as mentioned above, the taskbar has only one option dedicated to its own settings.

But then, are the window manager and its display possibilities under Windows 11? Microsoft decided to put them directly in the applications and Explorer windows, and that's pretty smart. By leaving the small cursor on the icon which opens a window on the whole screen, a new menu of icons appears . Thanks to it, we can now place a window on the left, on the right, rather downwards, rather downwards, in a “frame” of 4 windows… In short, more possibilities are offered to you as regards the arrangement of the windows. A little detail that changes your life.

SKYPE DISAPPEARS IN FAVOR OF MICROSOFT TEAMS

It's a small surprise: the first build available does not preinstall Skype and does away with all its integrations normally present in Windows 10. Everything indicates that Windows 11 is preparing to replace Skype with Microsoft Teams. Skype wouldn't go away completely, since it would still be possible to install it through the Microsoft Store or as an x86 app. But that would be a major change for this software that Microsoft acquired ten years ago and has always pushed to the fore, not hesitating to abandon MSN, its old messaging system.

WINDOWS 11 WOULD BE FASTER THAN WINDOWS 10

According to the first benchmarks, Windows 11 is already faster than Windows 10 and should see its performance improve with the updates. Obviously, for the moment, these results should be taken with all the necessary precautions, since the new version of the operating system has not been finalized.

Nevertheless, if we are to believe the first tests carried out using software like Geekbench 5 or Cinebech R23, Windows 11 would be 2 to 8% faster than its predecessor . A figure which can reach 10% when we test the capabilities of the OS using the Chrome 91 browser. Microsoft would therefore have succeeded in optimizing its OS, without fundamentally changing the core. Note that the tests were performed on a Lakefield Core i7-L16G7 processor. From our side, we are waiting for the next generation of CPU and a definitive edition of Windows 11 to issue a final opinion on their relevance.

WHAT ARE THE FEATURES OF WINDOWS 11 THAT ARE STILL MISSING?

At the moment, the version of Windows 11 that Microsoft is working on is not yet finalized. The publisher has mainly relied on an “aesthetic” update of the OS, but new, deeper features should also emerge. For example, we are talking about full support for Android applications , without going through a third-party emulator like BlueStacks.

Another expected novelty of Windows 11: upon installation, Windows 11 offers you to “personalize your device” according to your uses (games, multimedia, creativity, work, etc.). If this function is present in the current beta of the OS, its effects are not visible for the moment. Again, we will have to wait for Microsoft to make an official presentation to find out more.

WHEN IS WINDOWS 11 RELEASED?

The new version of Windows 11 will be released in its final edition in 2021, that's for sure. The current version that has leaked seems finalized, or almost. Granted, it's still a bit early to judge, but we haven't encountered any major bugs with it. It may well be that Microsoft will release a finalized build during the summer. And that the most impatient rest assured: the Redmond giant obviously wants to broadcast a preview at the end of the conference on June 24, 2021 .

WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENT VERSIONS OF WINDOWS 11 AVAILABLE?

It is almost certain that Microsoft will apply its usual version program to Windows 11: home, professional and professional edition for work groups. This is also what the possibilities of installing Windows 11 from a USB key on a blank hard drive suggest.

On closer inspection, it also appears that Microsoft is planning to release an “SE” version of Windows 11. The difference with other versions of the OS? At first glance, nothing differentiates it from the classic version of the OS, except that it does not allow you to use Windows 11 locally. As a result, this may be an edition for online use only. We would therefore have to do with a version of Windows 11 developed for the Cloud, similar to what we find on the side of Google with Chrome OS.

WINDOWS 10 GOING TO DISAPPEAR?

Launched in 2015, Windows 10 could bow out after 10 years of existence.

Here again, it is still a little early to judge the future of Windows 10 as long as no official announcement has been made. On the other hand, if we stick to Microsoft's usual policy regarding new versions of Windows, Windows 10 is not going to go away anytime soon. Unless there is a final turnaround, the OS still has many long and beautiful years ahead of it. Windows XP for example has been maintained for almost 13 years, while Windows 7 has lasted for 11 years. Even the much-maligned Vista will have lived almost 11 years too.

Windows 10 arrived in its 6 th year, it is clear that its life cycle is not going to end anytime soon and he still has a few years to live, if that via updates security. This is what the operating system's software support page suggests. Microsoft is indeed talking about a deadline of October 14, 2025 for Windows 10 Home, Windows 10 Professional, Windows 10 Professional Education and Windows 10 Professional for Workstations.

https://youtu.be/MEv1EcTSQdA

HOW MUCH WILL WINDOWS 11 COST?

When Windows 10 was released in 2015, Microsoft “offered” all Windows 7 and Windows 8 users a license for its new operating system. This offer was only supposed to last for a year, but six later it is still active. We can reasonably hope that the editor of Redmond will repeat the operation with Windows 11: any holder of a license of Windows 7, 8.1, or Windows 10 should be entitled to a free migration to Windows 11.

We tested the operation which consists in using a serial number sometimes coming from Windows 7, sometimes from Windows 10. The registration of the license worked perfectly. As for the newcomers, they will probably have to put their hands in their pockets, knowing that at present, a full Windows 10 license costs between 145 and 259 euros depending on the version . It is likely that a Windows 11 license will show up at similar prices.

Finally, the last avenue to consider: the acquisition of a Windows subscription. A formula that would take on its full meaning with a Windows in the Cloud, the release of which also seems imminent. Recall that Microsoft already offers Office 365 in this format since 2011. If Windows 11 were to be declined in a remote version on the Cloud, it could well be that Microsoft launches such an offer.

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Have a good day! See you all soon.

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#Microsoft #tech_news #Windows #Windows_10 #Windows_11

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cdevroe · 3 years

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A few quick notes about building Micro.blog themes

It took me just a few days to convert the Cypress WordPress theme for use on Micro.blog. Since the layout, design, and styling for most elements was already done – the main work was learning Micro.blog’s theming model and moving the code bits around.

I thought it would be a good opportunity to jot down some observations since I was totally new to the theming model that Micro.blog uses. Perhaps this information will be useful to you.

Before I list my observations, let me just put out this call to action. If you’re reading this and have any abilities as a web developer, it is very simple to convert just about any website theme from any other platform into a Micro.blog theme. You should consider doing it to help the ecosystem around M.b grow. The team there is small. So helping them even a little bit will go a long way. If themes aren’t your thing, perhaps a plugin.

Here are my observations in no particular order:

M.b’s theming model is based on Hugo, a “static website engine”

The files are primarily standard HTML files with some curly brackets {{ }} for including other files, logic, loops, etc.

Your theme is not an island. A custom theme’s files supersede and replace the files in the blank theme that M.b uses. If you include a file (E.g. index.html) in your custom theme, it replaces the one in blank, but if you don’t, it will use the blank one instead. (I may be explaining this incorrectly, but at least this is my understanding)

Because M.b is very light on features, most themes need only consist of a few files to support most features

It pays to study the “lookup order” of Hugo themes. Like WordPress (which is far more complicated), any given URL can result in different files being loaded. By knowing this order it can cut down on frustration a bit.

M.b has a bunch of themes open sourced on their Github. Looking through each of those helps a lot.

M.b’s theme documentation is lacking. I’m sure this issue will get better over time now that the new Help Center is online. The more questions we ask and answer in this area, the more people will benefit.

If any M.b member makes any edits to a theme using the web editor, they will break their ability to get updates of your theme. I don’t see anyway around this, but it should be known.

Here is my workflow for testing and updating Cypress on Micro.blog. It is a little cumbersome, but no big deal in the grand scheme of things. I’m sure this workflow will improve with time.

Side note: I was running Hugo locally in a Docker container but I quickly abandoned that. M.b is unique enough in its feature-set that I found Hugo to not be a good environment to test against. Perhaps if I spent more time creating a M.b-like environment it would have cut down the number of builds I’ve had to push to the site.

Commit changes locally using git.

Push changes to the main branch on Github.

Log into M.b, click Design, click “Edit Custom Themes”, click “New Theme” and add a new theme with a version number (E.g. 2021.1.0b) – I would change this version number with every build I pulled from Github to bust M.b’s cache. It didn’t always work, but it worked most of the time.

Go back to Design settings page, set the theme for my blog to “Blank”, select my Custom Theme from the list, click “Update Microblog Settings”.

It would typically take 5-10 minutes for my changes to show up on my test blog.

Obviously, this isn’t ideal. So I recommend batching your updates as much as you can.

Once I had a build of Cypress that seemed to work as I had planned on the test blog, I would then set the version in the head.html file (see Line 4). Update the readme. Commit those changes. Push to Github, and tag the release. By setting the version in the head I’m able to determine what version someone is running when a bug is reported.

Lastly, a few tips:

The “photos” page is special for Micro.blog. There is a button under your Pages settings that says “Add Photos Page” if you don’t already have one. M.b. will filter out posts that have images in them to populate that page with content. It is a very different approach.

As far as I can tell, M.b loads images that are in posts in full resolution. The same goes for most indexes too. This can make page load times very, very long in some cases. One way to mitigate that is to turn on pagination so that there aren’t so many posts loaded per page. This is done in the config file. Another way is to use M.b’s thumbnail creation API. As far I know, this isn’t documented anywhere. If it is, I missed it. But it is in use. You can reverse engineer the URL structure yourself. Here is an example URL: https://micro.blog/photos/480x/{{URL TO IMAGE GOES HERE}} – This will dynamically create a new image 480 pixels wide. You can see this in use here.

There is a page for /archive even if a Microblog doesn’t have that in their navigation. So I’d recommend including a list.archivehtml.html file in every single theme.

That’s about it. Hugo themes are a learning curve and are likely far more powerful and flexible than even M.b currently has use for. Once you wrap your head around how it works, it is pretty simple to convert a theme and I think it’d be great if more people did so.

Lastly, if any of the above is totally incorrect, please let me know and I’ll correct it.

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wineanddinosaur · 4 years

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VinePair Podcast: How Will the Coming Recession Change the Drinks Industry?

With the United States at the early stages of a Covid-19-sparked recession, there’s much that can be learned about how previous recessions have impacted the drinks industry. In the past, wine and spirits sales have remained constant while beer has struggled. Will that be what happens this time around? Will the fact that gathering in public remains either prohibited or at least ill-advised further change how the public purchases liquor? Will the demise of on-premise sales force more products into the retail market, and will big grocers and retailers change their selections?

These are the questions that VinePair CEO Adam Teeter, CCO and editor in chief Erica Duecy, and co-host Zach Geballe tackle on this week’s episode of the VinePair Podcast, as we look to understand where an economic and public health crisis will impact the industry, and how consumers may suffer or benefit as a result.

Listen on iTunes

Listen on Spotify

Listen online, or checkout out our conversation here:

Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Erica: From Connecticut, I’m Erica Duecy.

Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the VinePair podcast. Guys! Are we…? What week are we in?

E: Who knows?

Z: One thousand.

A: I was about to say a week and, I actually have no idea what week it is.

Z: Yeah.

A: Is it week seven; is it week nine? Someone told me it is week nine in an interview I did earlier today, and whoa, that’s a long time we’ve been doing this for. I just can’t, man, I can’t. It’s too much. I’m drinking through all my good stuff, and I’m getting really nervous. If you listen to the podcast, and you want to send me wine, please send wine. I’m more than happy, you know. Email us at [email protected], and I’ll send you my address. Seriously, all of the good stuff is just gone. I have to do another wine shop run. What about you guys?

E: Yeah, I’ve moved into some Scotches. Some Scotches are treating me well right now. And other than that, I literally have gone through every single bottle of wine that I intend to drink from my very small collection. And now I need some new stuff. So also, we’ll take what you’ve got out there.

A: Exactly. See, for me, I have bottles that I still have but these are bottles I don’t wanna open right now. And I have a really tiny little wine fridge that holds 24 bottles.

Z: Wow, I still have some wine, but that doesn’t mean I won’t take some either. But I’ve always had the wine collecting bug, and so I still have a good number of bottles. Although it is definitely striking that balance between “Well, is this the night that I want to open that bottle?” But we’ve been trying to say, “You know what? We might as well.”

A: Right.

Z: Because for my wife and me, usually the bottle of wine at dinner is the thing that we look forward to most besides possibly any time when our son is asleep. That’s also a good thing.

A: I’m pretty proud of myself, I’m going to make a fat-washed vodka this week.

E: Oooh!

Z: Oh my goodness!

A: And I’m going to make an olive oil Martini tomorrow night.

Z: Cool.

E: Oh my gosh. Instagram it!

A: You know, I’m so mad at myself though. I photographed the first part of the process of adding the olive oil and mixing it, then I put it in the freezer yesterday morning, and then took it out last night to take the olive oil. (Because the olive oil will separate and freeze at the top and take it off.) And I was going to take a picture of this, and I totally forgot and got so involved in making sure that I did it correctly that I don’t have that photo. So I will definitely Instagram the drink. I don’t know why I was really craving an olive oil Martini.

E: Did it pick up the olive oil notes pretty well?

A: It has, yeah. And what’s really interesting is that I do not like vodka Martinis. Let’s be clear.

E: Yeah.

A: I’m a gin Martini person. But every single bartender I’ve read who does this olive oil washing says you have to do it with vodka because the gin has so many botanicals in it already that it’s not going to pick up anything. But it also has this sort of smooth viscosity to it now that’s very interesting.

E: Nice.

A: I’m very curious to see how this will now taste. So I’m going to give it a try, I think, tomorrow. Tonight’s burger night, so…

Z: Probably not an olive oil Martini…

E: It sounds pretty good to me.

A: I also did the same thing, I have a huge batch of Negronis in the freezer, in the fridge now. So I just made a batch, and it’s getting better, so I keep coming back to it. Maybe it’ll be like a smaller Negroni before I open a bottle of wine and eat a cheeseburger.

E: Nice, nice!

Z: It’s party night in the Teeter household. I’m excited for you.

E: So are you noticing the Negroni flavors sort of mellow out and sort of smooth out a little bit, or what’s the change that you’re seeing?

A: They actually harmonize more. It all sort of tastes as one, as opposed to being very clear to pick out the Campari or the vermouth. It all seems to taste like more of a cohesive cocktail.

E: Nice.

A: I don’t think it’s going to improve much more. I know people are saying, “Oh my gosh! I put my Negroni in the fridge and leave it for six months.” That’s not going to happen. It’s going to be gone next week. But it is interesting to think about being able to do that. I’ve been doing a lot of experiments. It’s the only thing I have to keep me focused besides work. I have to have these little side projects. I have a lot of other side projects that aren’t drinks-related, but I don’t think people want to hear about how I’m doing touch up painting in my apartment, and I have a list that’s being delivered to me that I need to accomplish every weekend. That’s not good podcast content.

Z: Not this podcast, at least.

A: I didn’t tell you guys that I’m going to be a guest on Bob Vila’s “This Old House” later?

E: Exactly.

A: I’ll tell you everything about it. But besides that, who knows? It’s crazy.

Z: Erica, I have a question for you before we get into the topic. I know that a couple of weeks ago we were talking about how one of the challenges for you being in Connecticut was there are very few options for delivery food. Have you guys already exhausted everything that is available to you? Or are there still places that think, “maybe we’ll try and order God-knows-what from this place.”

E: No, that was it. There were two places that were doing delivery. But I also have to say it opens my eyes to the challenges of wine buying and spirits buying as well. Some of the liquor stores up here are pretty well stocked with spirits, but the wine… I’ve tried out all of the stores in this little area, and there are really big commercial brands, and really not much that I want to purchase. So now I have turned to online, and I’m ordering some wine up here. I think that that’s a challenge that in Seattle, Zach, or in New York, for Adam and I, that we’re just not running into. We don’t see that super-limited selection, where the shops may be using one or two importers, tops, for their wines that are from outside the country. And then within the country, within the U.S., the wines are just the same exact labels from store to store to store, with very little variation. It’s not something I’ve run into that much before.

A: It’s really interesting, though. It’s not what this podcast topic was going to be about. But when we first started VinePair, because Josh and I went to college in Atlanta, before Atlanta had become this amazing drinks scene since we’ve left (I’m from Alabama) we had this recognition — that is most of the country. And when you start talking about these specific Cru Beaujolais or Syrahs, you alienate so much of the wine-drinking population because they can’t find those wines. What they can drink is very limited. I think having that experience of now being in Connecticut for a few weeks and seeing this is what it’s like, unless hopefully more people will buy online, it should be pretty eye-opening, right?

E: Yeah.

A: It should be. It’s a return to at least seeing what everyone else drinks.

E: Yeah, absolutely. And you look for some of the importers that have portfolios you can rely on, where you trust anything that they’re bringing in. If you can’t find any of those importers whose portfolios you drink from, then what are you stuck with? So, I’m pulling out that hard seltzer.

A: You have to. So speaking of pulling out hard seltzers, and all other things, today’s topic is an interesting one, which is basically: What happens in a recession? What happens to drinking in a recession? And you know we all talked about discussing this because most people, most economists, believe that is going to be what occurs. The idea of a check mark rebound is probably not an accurate one. Although again Cheeto-in-Chief may believe so, I hate to tell him that it’s not going to work. Just like it doesn’t work to inject sanitizer into yourself as he claimed yesterday.

E: Or sunlight? Sunlight was the latest.

A: Yeah, I just can’t, man. The things this guy says. You know we were sort of curious to look back at a bunch of recessions and see what happens. And what happens is normally what most people assume, but there are some surprises. So, the biggest things that we’ve realized is, first of all, obviously spirits sales go way up, right? I mean, alcohol has always been considered to be recession-proof in general. But spirits sales definitely skyrocket, followed by wine, and then, actually what I think is really interesting is that beer lags behind, and that was surprising to me looking at a lot of the data. Simply because I think a lot of people assume times of economic uncertainty mean we turn to beer. Because we’re America, and we turn to beer. I think it’s interesting that actually no, we don’t. That at least if history is any guide, we lean into spirits, and we lean into wine. So as we start thinking about the recession, what do you guys think in terms of drinking during this time? These economic times.

E: I have a little bit of data I can share just to set the stage… for listeners who may not be familiar with what happened in the past recessions. So, if we look at where we are since 2012, the total beverage alcohol volume sales has been pretty flat with slight ups and downs but growing at about 1 percent a year from 2012 to 2019. During that time wine, spirits and RTDs (ready-to-drink cocktails) are all driving growth, and then beer has been in decline. That’s the more recent picture. But looking at the Great Recession, which was 2007 to 2009, even when unemployment was at 10 percent, the highest of the most recent recessions, the wine, spirits and RTD volumes were flat to slightly up and beer was down. It’s interesting that beer was down. At the 2001 to 2003 recession, unemployment was around 6 percent, and all of the volumes were growing except for beer. So it’s consistent that wine, spirits, and RTDs have all been growing at either flat to slightly up in recent recessions, and all of the time continuously beer has been down. I think it’s an interesting question. Why has beer been more impacted? And what might we see, moving forward from where we’re at now?

Z: I didn’t know those numbers before we started this podcast, I guess that in ignorance there is some sort of bliss. And it really, really surprises me because as Adam was mentioning a minute ago, a lot of beer is relatively inexpensive, certainly compared with much in the way of wine and spirits. Although there are also obviously very inexpensive spirits and wine available as well. I think that maybe part of why I would’ve assumed that beer would’ve been doing better in this period of time would be that it is something that fits into that sort of grocery store model that Erica was describing before.

A: Yeah.

Z: Where, if you like your macro lagers, every time you grab a 6-pack or a 12-pack you know exactly what you’re going to get. The availability is consistent throughout the country for the most part. And those things I assume still drive the bulk of sales. But I do wonder if there is some sense in which we see maybe one pattern out of this, and it’s just a guess, I have no real answer. But, I’m wondering if that part of what’s going on in these recessions is that something like a bottle of wine or a cocktail or a spirit in general, however you consume it, is seen by people as a sort of affordable luxury, right? You might have to cut out a lot of the things in a recession that you would otherwise consider to be pleasurable. Maybe you don’t go on vacation, or you don’t buy a new car, which is maybe not a luxury but it’s still an item that you might not buy in those periods of time. But a bottle of wine, and it doesn’t have to be an expensive bottle of wine, but a $15 or $20 or $25 dollar bottle of wine, or a bottle of gin or something like that, feels like the kind of luxury that you can still indulge in. And for the most part beer, with very few exceptions, doesn’t convey the same sense of indulgence. Especially the same kind of macro lagers that I described. Maybe people think, if I’m going to drink, maybe I’m going to drink something that I’m going to feel like is taking my mind off of this situation in more ways than just intoxicating me, but also making me feel a little bit of luxury in the way that I can afford.

A: I think that that’s a nice perspective to have. It’s a nice theory. I would like to think that that’s why. I think it has more to do with bang for buck, though.

Z: Could be.

A: I think beer just traditionally is lower alcohol, and while I support drinking to numb pain, a lot of studies show that in times of recession, even what’s happening now, people do turn to alcohol as a very quick way to deal with depression, anxiety, sleepless nights, etc. Again, I do not support that that is why anyone would turn to drinking. But also, people are much more budget-conscious. So, if you’re out and you want to have fun with your friends and you want to have a little bit of a buzz, it’ll take you a much quicker time getting there with a glass or two of wine or one or two whiskeys than it would with a traditional macro beer. The other thing is that beer has always been seen as something that’s very affordable, but when you get to these beers that are higher-end that are higher in alcohol, the crafts, you get to a price point that people start saying, well I can see why I would’ve paid that during boom times. Beer became a luxurious item to me but now in a recession, why am I spending $14.99 or $15.99, $16.99 on a 4-pack of beer? Which is basically what has flooded the market in the craft beer world, right? And so they probably turn away from that and say, I’d much rather spend $20 on a bottle of wine than $14.99, $15.99 on a 4-pack of beer. That’s also what I was thinking, because what we’re seeing now in the coronavirus is that the price of wine — a lot of people are paying around 20 bucks. Which indicates that people are still willing to pay for quality. But I wonder if the thought process there is: Well it’s more glasses, it’s a little bit more communal. Spirits, I understand. Spirits is the easiest one, right? Spirits is just bang for buck. But the beer one is hard to understand for sure.

E: Yeah, and I should mention all the recession data that I was referring to is the IWSR. Their takeaways both now, and Nielsen’s takeaways as well, is that we’re seeing double-digit sales growth at retail. We’re seeing a ton of sales happening at retail. Most of that volume that is moving through retail right now is value brands. People are definitely focused on value brands, and I think that takes us into the macro-lagers. That takes us into all of the less-expensive, not-craft spirits and wines. There’s definitely that value proposition that consumers are looking for right now.

Z: It’s kind of interesting to think going forward about the specific contours of what this recession would look like. Because unlike everything else that we’ve discussed, you know the previous couple of recessions going back as far as you want, one element that’s going to be very different with this recession is the lingering questions about public health and safety and to what extent that is going to work alongside a recession to drive consumer business. Adam, I was just listening to and editing your upcoming interview with Francesco Zonin, and it was really interesting to hear him talk about how for their company, which has wineries not just in Italy but in other parts of the world, work across a wide range of price points from very affordable value brands to luxury wines. To think about looking ahead to this upcoming, the ongoing and upcoming recession and selling higher-end wine might be challenging in the first place. You’re also going to be combining the challenge with the fact that for a lot of people things like on-premise, or restaurant and bar sales may not return at all. Or may return in a much more constrained manner.

A: Yeah.

Z: What I really wonder is what some of these producers (and it’s not just the high-end wine, it’s high-end spirits, high-end beer as you were talking about), do we see these things in grocery stores? Because a lot of what Erica is talking about has to do with the product mix at your typical grocery store, as she’s experienced. It is oriented around the kind of person who is going to, in normal times, do their wine shopping day-of at a grocery store. Which is a lot of people. It’s the bulk of the market.

A: Yeah.

Z: But those people are generally looking for $15 to $20 bottles of wine if that, and they’re not necessarily saying: ‘Oh, let me think about what I’m going to want to drink for the next two months. Let me collect. It is wines that are grab-and-go in a functional sense and beer and spirits, too, for the most part. One of these questions, and I don’t have a clear answer, it’s just been kicking around my brain for a while: To what extent does the limited opportunities to buy, combined with perhaps limited purchasing power, really drive what people are buying in the next six months or a year? I wonder if it’ll be skewed even more heavily towards these value brands than it normally would be.

A: I don’t know. I think there’s a few things that we’re seeing now that could be interesting. One, I think we’re going to have to see these brands, that are normally restaurant-focused brands, move to off-premise. I read a news analysis this morning actually, I should’ve sent it to you guys, but Terlato has put out a bunch of numbers that show that within the first week they shifted a bunch of brands that were on-premise only, including Gaja, or primarily on-premise only, to lots of off-premise retailers, and the sales have started to boom. What they’ve seen is that there were lots of off-premise retailers that really wanted these wines. They were just never offered them because Terlato had positioned them as restaurant wines. And there are people in these areas where they are selling them now that have wanted to buy them, saying “Holy crap, this is what that wine looks like without a three-times mark-up.” Because they were only ever buying them at restaurants. So, I think you will see that re-positioning, and that is I don’t completely agree about the Francesco Zonin interview, where he said there are certain brands that can only exist in restaurants. I actually don’t think that’s true. I think good wine can exist everywhere, and I think that that’s an old-school wine-industry idea. There are certain wines that can only become who they are in the restaurant. It’s not true. If it’s a good wine and you go to a great wine shop, and the person behind the counter is knowledgeable (which a lot of these wine shops nowadays are), they can sell that wine to a consumer and explain to them why: what they should make with it and how they should drink it at home. I also think that in addition to that, right Zach, we’re talking about the risk of going out, right? So how much are you going to be willing to pay and take the risk? I know Erica and I were having this conversation about a week ago in our editorial meeting. Am I willing to go out and sit at a restaurant, first of all, in a recession? So, hopefully everything goes well and everyone that you know still has a good job? But someone you know maybe doesn’t, and they’re a guest with you, so you’re being more budget- conscious because of that. Also because there’s just uncertainty. Plus, there’s the social distancing that we may have for the next X amount of time so are you willing to pay $27 for a cheeseburger? Or $20? Are you willing to pay $16 anymore for a cocktail, or is only $10 what you’re willing to spend out? Because you’re saying, if I’m already taking the risk, I’m also not going to get what I feel like is now fleeced. I wonder how much that will play, too, in this recession. Because at least in past recessions, as we’ve said, there wasn’t the added risk of feeling like you were vulnerable being in the restaurant. Now there are some people who could feel that. Although people are saying that obviously in China opening back up, they don’t see that as much, but we’ll see, once the Western world gets ahold of this thing, how we react because we’re all neurotic. So I wonder if that will impact it. Erica what do you think?

E: There are so many facets. It’s just so hard to really know what is going to come out of this, and where we’re going to be moving forward. One of the things I was just thinking about and we were discussing as part of an article we just did, was about low- and no-ABV spirits — the low- and no-ABV movements that have been emerging and are in their nascent stages. Distill Ventures, backed by Diageo, has incubated a lot of the brands that are low- and no-ABV spirits. These brands are selling bottles that are $30 dollars for a 700-milliliter bottle, for example. Now you have small brands, which may be low- and no-ABV brands, which don’t have that bang for your buck. What’s going to happen to this whole other sector of craft? Where are we going to go in literally every single different sector? There are so many different challenges that we’re facing, and it’s really hard to know how this is all going to shake out.

A: It’s going to be really interesting. I think we can have some idea from the past, but I think Zach, what you bring up is really important to remember. The reason that we’re gonna have this recession is very different than the past. And it adds a whole new layer to things that I think we’ve never thought about before. I think coupled on top of that is this idea that a lot of us, we’ve seen this. Last week we had our best traffic week ever besides New Year’s Eve, besides the week of New Year’s, right? And we are seeing massive traffic to our wine recommendations and cocktail recipes. And so we know from that, that people are drinking better at home and making cocktails at home. I guess what I’m trying to say in a way too long way is….

Z: For the first time ever on this podcast.

A: I know, seriously. Hey, you’re guilty of it, too.

Z: Oh, me? Definitely.

A: Prior to 2008? I didn’t know how to make a drink. Even though there was a recession I still, if I wanted a really good drink, was going to ultimately go out and treat myself. Now I feel like I’ve perfected how to make pretty good drinks over the last X weeks. I feel like all of us on this podcast have gotten even better at it. I feel like there’s a lot of my friends who have been sending me pictures of all the great drinks they’ve been making and all the great wines they’ve discovered, and again then it comes into starting to do this calculus in your head: Why would I go out? I know how to make a good drink here, and I know that I can buy the spirit I like and these ingredients. I do the math and it comes down to costing me $3 to make this one cocktail. And out there it’s $15.

Z: That was the point I was going to make, and I have one other thing to add to it. It’s good! We’re on the same page here. Adam, you mentioned earlier that people are going to look at some of these wines that they maybe didn’t totally realize what the wholesale price was. Or even what the price at retail would be and say, “Well, why do I wanna pay two-and-a-half, three, three-and-a-half times markup in a restaurant when I can buy that bottle, if I can buy that bottle somewhere else and open it at home? And whether it’s people being more willing to cook after this because they’ve had to, to some extent, or even just more familiar with or comfortable with delivery services, or even picking up for takeout. I think those are things that are going to stick around for a while because even as restaurants reopen, they’re going to have to have some significant delivery presence just to keep volume up. You’re right, I think we’re going to be in an era. In some ways as someone who’s worked in restaurants for a long time it depresses me, but also as someone who likes to entertain and to cook, I do think we’re going to see when people start moving back out into the world in some controlled way. I think a lot of what you’re going to see is people getting together with their friends, with their family and showing off their skills, right? Showing off their cooking skills, their baking skills, their ability to make cocktails. Maybe some wines that they really like. It does mean that for brands of all sizes, what they’re going to have to do going forward to remain a vibrant part of the marketplace is they’re going to have to figure out how to get inside that loop, right? And whether that’s through recommendations on sites like VinePair or whether that’s through being more present in grocery stores, the sorts of liquor and wine shops that are open. The gatekeepers are going to be a little different than they have been in the past and that I think is actually not a bad thing. Adam, you and I have sort of bemoaned a couple times on this podcast way back, 10 thousand years ago, the gatekeeper effect that sommeliers had taken on in some parts of the wine world and it’s no different with other categories as well.

A: Totally.

Z: And this is, you know, shaking the snow globe up and while there’s a lot of negatives and I’m not saying this is good, but it is the case that there is an opportunity here for everyone involved, whether you’re a producer, you’re a consumer, you’re someone who is on the on-premise or off-premise side, to say how do I get inside that loop, and how do I connect with people who are going to be enjoying these products in a functionally different way than they did six months ago?

E: Another thing I have been so interested in the past year or two years is the premiumization trend… That was the trend around more consumers wanting to drink less, but better… with a little bit of the lower ABV – not quite sober-curious – but that idea of not drinking as much volume, but drinking better quality. So, the question I have related to entertaining at home, and understanding the products better, and experimenting more with making cocktails, is: In this recessionary environment, will we see that trend continue? I think that’s something that could be really, really interesting to explore in an article. In this environment, will consumers – now that they know more, now that they’re entertaining in small, intimate groups and really understanding their products better – will they continue that move?

A: That’s really interesting. I think that’s a good place for us to leave it, too. With that question of what will happen? And will people continue to move premium or not? Because I honestly don’t know. I would like to hope yes.

Z: Yeah, this is like our first ever cliff-hanger ending podcast.

E: Now we’re going to have to write about it.

A: I know. I would like to hope yes. That the premiumization trend will continue. I have to think that it will a little bit just because you have an entire generation who have gotten used to these nice things. I don’t see them all of a sudden turning away from them. I see them as you were saying, Erica: maybe buying less. But when they do buy, buying higher quality. I don’t see this whole millennial generation that’s embraced organic and biodynamic and craft all of a sudden saying, “You know what, I’ll just take whatever the $6 jug is.” I just don’t. But, maybe that’s me. I think that what could skew the data unfortunately in the short term is there’s still a lot of boomers out there, and they for sure will in this recession. But I do think that the Gen Xers and the millennials and the Gen Zs will probably continue to move premium just because that’s what they’ve been doing. And I don’t think you’ll see a massive reverse.

E: Yeah.

Z: I agree.

A: This was another interesting one. Everyone listening, thanks for spending your morning, afternoon, evening with us – whenever it is you’re now listening to this podcast. We really appreciate it. If you continue to enjoy the VinePair podcast of course always drop us a line at [email protected]. Let us know what you enjoy, what you don’t, and topics you’d like to see us cover in the future. And, of course, always please leave a review, rating etc. on iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, or wherever it is that you get your podcasts. It helps everyone discover what we’re doing here at VinePair. Erica, Zach, talk to you next week.

E: See you then.

Z: Sounds great.

Ed. Note: Transcript has been edited for brevity and clarity.

The article VinePair Podcast: How Will the Coming Recession Change the Drinks Industry? appeared first on VinePair.

source https://vinepair.com/articles/drinks-industry-changes-recession/

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johnboothus · 4 years

Text

VinePair Podcast: How Will the Coming Recession Change the Drinks Industry?

Listen on iTunes

Listen on Spotify

Listen online, or checkout out our conversation here:

Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Erica: From Connecticut, I’m Erica Duecy.

Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the VinePair podcast. Guys! Are we…? What week are we in?

E: Who knows?

Z: One thousand.

A: I was about to say a week and, I actually have no idea what week it is.

Z: Yeah.

E: Yeah, I’ve moved into some Scotches. Some Scotches are treating me well right, right now. And other than that, I literally have gone through every single bottle of wine that I intend to drink from my very small collection. And now I need some new stuff. So also, we’ll take what you’ve got out there.

A: Exactly. See, for me, I have bottles that I still have but these are bottles I don’t wanna open right now. And I have a really tiny little wine fridge that holds 24 bottles.

A: Right.

Z: Because for my wife and me, usually the bottle of wine at dinner is the thing that we look forward to most besides possibly any time when our son is asleep. That’s also a good thing.

A: I’m pretty proud of myself, I’m going to make a fat-washed vodka this week.

E: Oooh!

Z: Oh my goodness!

A: And I’m going to make an olive oil Martini tomorrow night.

Z: Cool.

E: Oh my gosh. Instagram!

E: Did it pick up all of the notes of olive oil pretty well?

A: It has, yeah. And what’s really interesting is that I do not like vodka Martinis. Let’s be clear.

E: Yeah.

E: Nice.

A: I’m very curious to see how this will now taste. So I’m going to give it a try, I think, tomorrow. Tonight’s burger night, so…

Z: Probably not an olive oil Martini…

E: It sounds pretty good to me.

E: Nice, nice!

Z: It’s party night in the Teeter household. I’m excited for you.

E: So are you noticing the Negroni flavors sort of mellow out and sort of smooth out a little bit, or what’s the change that you’re seeing?

A: They actually harmonize more. It all sort of tastes as one, as opposed to being very clear to pick out the Campari or the vermouth. It all seems to taste like more of a cohesive cocktail.

E: Nice.

Z: Not this podcast, at least.

A: I didn’t tell you guys that I’m going to be a guest on Bob Vila’s “This Old House” later?

E: Exactly.

A: I’ll tell you everything about it. But besides that, who knows? It’s crazy.

E: No, that was it. There were two places that were doing delivery. But I also have to say it does open my eyes much more to the challenges of wine buying and spirits buying as well. I have to say that some of the liquor stores up here are pretty well stocked with spirits, but the wine, I have got to say that I have tried out all of the stores in this little area, and there are really big commercial brands. There is really not much that I want to purchase, so now I have turned to online, and I’m ordering some wine up here. Because I’ve gone to the stores, I know what’s here, and I’m telling you, it is not that much. I think that that’s a challenge that in Seattle, Zach, or in New York, for Adam and I, we’re just not running into a limited, super, super-limited selection where they may be using one or two importers, tops, for their wines that are from outside the country. And then within the country, within the U.S., the wines are just the same exact labels from store to store to store, with very little variation. It’s not something I’ve run into that much.

E: Yeah.

A: It should be. It’s a return to at least seeing what everyone else drinks.

E: Yeah, absolutely. And you look for some of the importers or the go-to ones that you can rely on anything that they’re bringing in. If you can’t find any of those importers where you really typically drink from their portfolios, then what are you stuck with? So, pulling out that hard seltzer.

A: You have to. So speaking of pulling out hard seltzers, and all other things, today’s topic is an interesting one, which is basically: What happens in a recession? What happens to drinking in a recession? And you know we all talked about discussing this because most people, most economists, believe that is going to be what occurs. The idea of a check mark rebound is probably not an accurate one. Although again Cheeto-in-chief may believe so, I hate to tell him that it’s not going to work. Just like it doesn’t work to inject sanitizer into yourself as he claimed yesterday.

E: Or sunlight? Sunlight was the latest.

E: I have a little bit of data I can share just to set the stage… for listeners who may not be familiar with what happened in the past recessions. So, if we look at where we are since 2012, the total beverage alcohol volume sales has been pretty flat with slight ups and downs but growing at about 1 percent a year from 2012 to 2019. During that time wine, spirits and RTDs (RTDs would be hard seltzers and so forth) are all driving growth, and then beer has been in decline. That’s the more recent picture. But looking at the Great Recession, which was 2007 to 2009, even when unemployment was at 10 percent, the highest of the most recent recessions, the wine, spirits and RTD volumes were flat to slightly up and beer was down. It’s interesting that beer was down. At the 2001 to 2003 recession, unemployment was around 6 percent, and all of the volumes were growing except for beer. So it’s consistent that wine, spirits, and RTDs have all been growing at either flat to slightly up in recent recessions, and all of the time continuously beer has been down. I think it’s an interesting question. Why has beer been more impacted? And what might we see, moving forward from where we’re at now?

A: Yeah.

A: I think that that’s a nice perspective to have. It’s a nice theory. I would like to think that that’s why. I think it has more to do with bang for buck, though.

Z: Could be.

E: Yeah, and I think one takeaway, I should mention all the recession data that I was referring to is the IWSR. Their takeaways both now and Nielsen’s takeaways as well is that we’re seeing double-digit sales growth at retail. We’re seeing a ton of sales happening at retail. The most of that volume that is moving through retail right now is value brands. People are definitely focused on value brands, and I think that takes us into the macro-lagers. That takes us into all of the less-expensive, not craft spirits and wines. There’s definitely that value proposition that consumers are looking for right now.

A: Yeah.

A: I don’t know. I think… I think there’s a few things that we’re seeing now that could be interesting. One, I think we’re going to have to see these brands, that are normally restaurant-focused brands, move to off-premise. I read a news analysis this morning actually, I should’ve sent it to you guys, but Terlato has put out a bunch of numbers that show that within the first week they shifted a bunch of brands that were on-premise only, including Gaja, or primarily on-premise only, to lots of off-premise retailers, and the sales have started to boom. What they’ve seen is that there were lots of off-premise retailers that really wanted these wines. They were just never offered them because Terlato had positioned them as restaurant wines. And there are people in these areas where they are selling them now that have wanted to buy them, saying “Holy crap, this is what that wine looks like without a three-times mark-up.” Because they were only ever buying them at restaurants. So, I think you will see that re-positioning, and that is I don’t completely agree about the Francesco Zonin interview, where he said there are certain brands that can only exist in restaurants. I actually don’t think that’s true. I think good wine can exist everywhere, and I think that that’s an old-school wine-industry idea. There are certain wines that can only become who they are in the restaurant. It’s not true. If it’s a good wine and you go to a great wine shop, and the person behind the counter is knowledgeable (which a lot of these wine shops nowadays are), they can sell that wine to a consumer and explain to them why: what they should make with it and how they should drink it at home. I also think that in addition to that, right Zach, we’re talking about the risk of going out, right? So how much are you going to be willing to pay and take the risk? I know Erica and I were having this conversation about a week ago in our editorial meeting. Am I willing to go out and sit at a restaurant, first of all, in a recession? So, hopefully everything goes well and everyone that you know still has a good job? But someone you know maybe doesn’t, and they’re a guest with you, so you’re being more budget- conscious because of that. Also because there’s just uncertainty. Plus, there’s the social distancing that we may have for the next X amount of time so are you willing to pay $27 for a cheeseburger? Or $20? Are you willing to pay $16 anymore for a cocktail, or is only $10 what you’re willing to spend out? Because you’re saying, if I’m already taking the risk, I’m also not going to get what I feel like is now fleeced. I wonder how much that will play, too, in this recession. Because at least in past recessions, as we’ve said, there wasn’t the added risk of feeling like you were vulnerable being in the restaurant. Now there are some people who could feel that. Although people are saying that obviously in China opening back up, they don’t see that as much, but we’ll see, once the Western world gets ahold of this thing, how we react because we’re all neurotic. So I wonder if that will impact it. Erica what do you think?

E: There’s so many facets. It’s just so hard to really know what is going to come out of this, and where we’re going to be moving forward. One of the things I was just thinking about and we were discussing as part of an article we just did, was about low- and no-ABV wine — well, spirits mostly — but the low- and no-ABV movements that have been emerging and are in their nascent stages. But a lot of brands and even Distill Ventures backed by Diageo has incubated a lot of these brands, that are these low- and no-ABV spirits that are selling out there these bottles, $30 dollars for a 700-milliliter bottle, for example. Now you have small brands, which may be low- and no-ABV brands, which don’t have that bang for your buck. What’s going to happen to this whole other sector of craft? Where are we going to go in literally every single different sector? There is a different challenge that we’re facing, and it’s really hard to know how this is all going to shake out.

Z: For the first time ever on this podcast.

A: I know, seriously. Hey, you’re guilty of it, too.

Z: Oh, me? Definitely.

A: Totally.

E: And one interesting thing is, I have been so interested in the past year or two years about the premiumization trend… That was the trend around more consumers wanting to drink less, but better… with a little bit of the lower ABV or not quite sober-curious but moving into that idea of just not drinking as much volume, but drinking better quality. So, the question I have related to entertaining at home and really understanding your products better and experimenting more with making cocktails and so forth is: In this recessionary environment, will we see that trend continue? I think that’s something that could be really, really interesting to explore in an article or something. In this environment, will consumers, now that they know more, now that they’re entertaining in small, intimate groups and really understanding their products better, will they continue that move?

Z: Yeah, this is like our first ever cliff-hanger ending podcast.

E: Now we’re going to have to write about it.

E: Yeah.

Z: I agree.

E: See you then.

Z: Sounds great.

The article VinePair Podcast: How Will the Coming Recession Change the Drinks Industry? appeared first on VinePair.

Via https://vinepair.com/articles/drinks-industry-changes-recession/

source https://vinology1.weebly.com/blog/vinepair-podcast-how-will-the-coming-recession-change-the-drinks-industry

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isaiahrippinus · 4 years

Text

VinePair Podcast: How Will the Coming Recession Change the Drinks Industry?

Listen on iTunes

Listen on Spotify

Listen online, or checkout out our conversation here:

Adam: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Erica: From Connecticut, I’m Erica Duecy.

Zach: And in Seattle, Washington, I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the VinePair podcast. Guys! Are we…? What week are we in?

E: Who knows?

Z: One thousand.

A: I was about to say a week and, I actually have no idea what week it is.

Z: Yeah.

A: Exactly. See, for me, I have bottles that I still have but these are bottles I don’t wanna open right now. And I have a really tiny little wine fridge that holds 24 bottles.

A: Right.

Z: Because for my wife and me, usually the bottle of wine at dinner is the thing that we look forward to most besides possibly any time when our son is asleep. That’s also a good thing.

A: I’m pretty proud of myself, I’m going to make a fat-washed vodka this week.

E: Oooh!

Z: Oh my goodness!

A: And I’m going to make an olive oil Martini tomorrow night.

Z: Cool.

E: Oh my gosh. Instagram!

E: Did it pick up all of the notes of olive oil pretty well?

A: It has, yeah. And what’s really interesting is that I do not like vodka Martinis. Let’s be clear.

E: Yeah.

E: Nice.

A: I’m very curious to see how this will now taste. So I’m going to give it a try, I think, tomorrow. Tonight’s burger night, so…

Z: Probably not an olive oil Martini…

E: It sounds pretty good to me.

E: Nice, nice!

Z: It’s party night in the Teeter household. I’m excited for you.

E: So are you noticing the Negroni flavors sort of mellow out and sort of smooth out a little bit, or what’s the change that you’re seeing?

A: They actually harmonize more. It all sort of tastes as one, as opposed to being very clear to pick out the Campari or the vermouth. It all seems to taste like more of a cohesive cocktail.

E: Nice.

Z: Not this podcast, at least.

A: I didn’t tell you guys that I’m going to be a guest on Bob Vila’s “This Old House” later?

E: Exactly.

A: I’ll tell you everything about it. But besides that, who knows? It’s crazy.

E: Yeah.

A: It should be. It’s a return to at least seeing what everyone else drinks.

A: You have to. So speaking of pulling out hard seltzers, and all other things, today’s topic is an interesting one, which is basically: What happens in a recession? What happens to drinking in a recession? And you know we all talked about discussing this because most people, most economists, believe that is going to be what occurs. The idea of a check mark rebound is probably not an accurate one. Although again Cheeto-in-chief may believe so, I hate to tell him that it’s not going to work. Just like it doesn’t work to inject sanitizer into yourself as he claimed yesterday.

E: Or sunlight? Sunlight was the latest.

E: I have a little bit of data I can share just to set the stage… for listeners who may not be familiar with what happened in the past recessions. So, if we look at where we are since 2012, the total beverage alcohol volume sales has been pretty flat with slight ups and downs but growing at about 1 percent a year from 2012 to 2019. During that time wine, spirits and RTDs (RTDs would be hard seltzers and so forth) are all driving growth, and then beer has been in decline. That’s the more recent picture. But looking at the Great Recession, which was 2007 to 2009, even when unemployment was at 10 percent, the highest of the most recent recessions, the wine, spirits and RTD volumes were flat to slightly up and beer was down. It’s interesting that beer was down. At the 2001 to 2003 recession, unemployment was around 6 percent, and all of the volumes were growing except for beer. So it’s consistent that wine, spirits, and RTDs have all been growing at either flat to slightly up in recent recessions, and all of the time continuously beer has been down. I think it’s an interesting question. Why has beer been more impacted? And what might we see, moving forward from where we’re at now?

A: Yeah.

A: I think that that’s a nice perspective to have. It’s a nice theory. I would like to think that that’s why. I think it has more to do with bang for buck, though.

Z: Could be.

A: Yeah.

Z: For the first time ever on this podcast.

A: I know, seriously. Hey, you’re guilty of it, too.

Z: Oh, me? Definitely.

A: Totally.

Z: Yeah, this is like our first ever cliff-hanger ending podcast.

E: Now we’re going to have to write about it.

E: Yeah.

Z: I agree.

E: See you then.

Z: Sounds great.

The article VinePair Podcast: How Will the Coming Recession Change the Drinks Industry? appeared first on VinePair.

source https://vinepair.com/articles/drinks-industry-changes-recession/ source https://vinology1.tumblr.com/post/616647664855121920

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michaelfallcon · 5 years

Text

Aubrey Mills: The Sprudge Twenty Interview

Aubrey Mills – Dapper & Wise Roasters of Portland, OR (Photo by Graham Doughty)

Our coverage of the Sprudge Twenty interviews presented by Pacific Barista Series continues this week on Sprudge. Read more about the Sprudge Twenty and see all of our interviews here.

Nominated by Tyler Geel

Aubrey Mills is the Director of Wholesale at Dapper & Wise, a coffee roasting company with locations in Beaverton and Portland, Oregon. In her role with the company, Mills has avowedly championed the disparity in cost of production across the specialty coffee chain. She’s made public education her goal, focused on educating the public for the need to pay more for quality coffee and address wage instability for coffee producers. These issues were addressed at a recent forum hosted by La Marzocco USA in Seattle, Washington during a Dapper & Wise cafe residency.

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed.

What issue in coffee do you care about most?

The cost of production crisis weighs heavily on my mind. The first time I heard that many farmers are receiving less money for their green coffee than it costs them to produce was a little over a year ago. I had already been in coffee for four years prior, so finding out that this has been a massive issue for decades was shocking—I felt I should have at least heard about it. It’s not just morally wrong for an industry to be built up on the financial oppression of others, but these are people we call PARTNERS. This doesn’t sound like a partnership to me at all. Even if you look at this issue from a logistical point of view, it’s unwise business for, arguably, the most essential portion of our industry to have the greatest financial insecurity. I know this is common in other industries but I expect better of us in coffee.

What cause or element in coffee drives you?

Coffee is for everyone. I have heard someone say that there is the perfect amount of caffeine in a cup of coffee to bond with someone in conversation. I have no idea if this is scientific fact but I have been in that moment before. If coffee is for everyone and has the ability to facilitate connection then that is something I want to help grow.

What issue in coffee do you think is critically overlooked?

This is a hard question, but I would say that I would like to see more leaders in our industry providing tangible ways for people to be involved in solving issues apart from discussion. I don’t think I am the only one who hears about all of the problems we need to solve but have a hard time of figuring out where to start. It could be as detailed as providing intellectual resources to host an event and raise money for a cause, or it could be simple directions for how to break down these large concepts into conversations that can be had with customers and the public. If people are able to see where they can be useful in a cause and feel empowered to act then I think we will start to see actual change.

What is the quality you like best about coffee?

The smell of coffee is my favorite. Even garbage-tasting coffee usually smells great.

Did you experience a “god shot” or life-changing moment of coffee revelation early in your career?

The first time I tried a naturally processed coffee I was blown away. It was an Ethiopia Yirgacheffe that tasted like a blueberry muffin and I remember asking myself, “If coffee can taste like this, what else don’t I know?”

What is your idea of coffee happiness?

When we work as a fluid team from a place of strength not desperation.

If you could have any job in the coffee industry, what would it be and why?

I don’t have a specific job in mind but I would like to do more things like the panel event I hosted about the cost of production. I loved hearing different perspectives on the same idea and figuring out how to organize that information so the audience could get the most out of it. I am a value-driven person so I love being a part of solving big problems and building meaningful relationships. I don’t think these ideals are specific to a single job and I am starting to feel like the glass ceiling is only in my head.

Who are your coffee heroes?

To spotlight one, Junior’s Roasted Coffee is, in my mind, one of the strongest examples of value continuity in business. Mike & Caryn [Nelson] began Junior’s with the cost of production issue at its center–starting a dialog with customers and staff in every way shape and form. I kid you not, their wifi password is “askmeaboutcostofproduction”. On top of that, they are genuinely kind people who have invested themselves in our Portland community as well. HEROES.

If you could drink coffee with anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?

Other than my dad, Fred Rogers was my childhood hero. He always kept his values in the forefront of his work and had the ability to address major societal issues in a way that a child could understand. If you haven’t watched his documentary (I recommend it) you’ll see moments of his fury communicated with boldness, compassion, and logic in order to change minds. I’d like to be more like that in my work and relationships.

If you didn’t get bit by the coffee bug, what do you think you’d be doing instead?

I played soccer for a majority of my life and believe in the impact that the teamwork mentality can have on a community and an individual. I would probably be trying to work for Adidas in team-centric programs for local communities.

Do you have any coffee mentors?

Not officially—but I do have the benefit of working closely with some really incredible people. To call out one person in particular, Michael Ryan is one of the wisest and most patient human beings I’ve ever met. I have gone to him countless times to help me brainstorm problems I am trying to solve or personal goals I want to refine. He listens more often than he speaks and when he does—it’s always thoughtful (and usually profound). I likely wouldn’t be looking at coffee as a long-term career choice had it not been for working alongside Michael for the past five years.

What do you wish someone would’ve told you when you were first starting out in coffee?

Don’t wait for permission or dwell on qualifications.  Honestly, the very event that led me to this questionnaire was an emotional battle for me. I worked my ass off on that event and to understand “cost of production” as an issue but knew I was entirely out of my league to try and communicate its complexities (on stage, while being recorded). But I found a lot of comfort in the fact that it WASN’T ABOUT ME and that I was certainly qualified to ask pre-planned questions to highly intelligent people. All of this to say, I may have started taking risks earlier had I not been silently waiting for someone to give me the nod, and I don’t even know who that person is.

Name three coffee apparatuses you’d take into space with you.

I would take an AeroPress with an Able Brewing disc filter, obviously, because I would love to swim in a room full of thousands of tiny coffee bubbles. My second option would be espresso with a bottomless portafilter. I don’t totally know what would happen but I am trying to find out. My third option is a Voila packet because NASA might actually approve it coming on board.

Best song to brew coffee to:

Gary Clark Jr.’s “When I’m Gone” for a happy morning kind of situation.

Look into the crystal ball—where do you see yourself in 20 years?

I honestly have no clue, but hopefully I am still working with people I love and respect and contributing to something bigger than myself.

What’d you eat for breakfast this morning?

A protein shake. I have two very young dogs to tire out in the morning so the faster I can get calories into my body, the better.

When did you last drink coffee?

8:15 am

What was it?

Drip from the FETCO–Colombia Edilma Piedrahita.

Thank you.

The Sprudge Twenty is presented by Pacific Barista Series. For a complete list of 2019 Sprudge Twenty honorees please visit sprudge.com/twenty

Zachary Carlsen is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Zachary Carlsen on Sprudge.

The post Aubrey Mills: The Sprudge Twenty Interview appeared first on Sprudge.

Aubrey Mills: The Sprudge Twenty Interview published first on https://medium.com/@LinLinCoffee

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shebreathesslowly · 5 years

Text

Aubrey Mills: The Sprudge Twenty Interview

Aubrey Mills – Dapper & Wise Roasters of Portland, OR (Photo by Graham Doughty)

Our coverage of the Sprudge Twenty interviews presented by Pacific Barista Series continues this week on Sprudge. Read more about the Sprudge Twenty and see all of our interviews here.

Nominated by Tyler Geel

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed.

What issue in coffee do you care about most?

What cause or element in coffee drives you?

What issue in coffee do you think is critically overlooked?

What is the quality you like best about coffee?

The smell of coffee is my favorite. Even garbage-tasting coffee usually smells great.

Did you experience a “god shot” or life-changing moment of coffee revelation early in your career?

What is your idea of coffee happiness?

When we work as a fluid team from a place of strength not desperation.

If you could have any job in the coffee industry, what would it be and why?

Who are your coffee heroes?

If you could drink coffee with anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?

If you didn’t get bit by the coffee bug, what do you think you’d be doing instead?

Do you have any coffee mentors?

What do you wish someone would’ve told you when you were first starting out in coffee?

Name three coffee apparatuses you’d take into space with you.

Best song to brew coffee to:

Gary Clark Jr.’s “When I’m Gone” for a happy morning kind of situation.

Look into the crystal ball—where do you see yourself in 20 years?

I honestly have no clue, but hopefully I am still working with people I love and respect and contributing to something bigger than myself.

What’d you eat for breakfast this morning?

A protein shake. I have two very young dogs to tire out in the morning so the faster I can get calories into my body, the better.

When did you last drink coffee?

8:15 am

What was it?

Drip from the FETCO–Colombia Edilma Piedrahita.

Thank you.

The Sprudge Twenty is presented by Pacific Barista Series. For a complete list of 2019 Sprudge Twenty honorees please visit sprudge.com/twenty

Zachary Carlsen is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Zachary Carlsen on Sprudge.

The post Aubrey Mills: The Sprudge Twenty Interview appeared first on Sprudge.

from Sprudge http://bit.ly/2VP7vj0

#Sprudge

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thejustinmarshall · 5 years

Text

Anya Miller On Climbing, Cancer, And Creative Strategy

NOTE: In 2018, I started recording interviews with creatives (writers, filmmakers, podcasters, photographers, editors, etc.) in the adventure world. I’m publishing the highlights of those interviews monthly in 2019.

Everyone finds their way into adventure storytelling in a different way, but Anya Miller’s journey to working on film projects, creative campaigns, and podcasts for Duct Tape Then Beer is definitely one of the less straightforward ones: It started with a career in architecture, then bedbugs, then cancer, then a mid-career internship making the same salary she made as a lifeguard in high school, then a job at a big design and creative firm, then finally going to work with two of her longtime friends, Fitz and Becca Cahall. Oh, and lots of climbing, snowboarding, mountain biking.

You’ve probably seen something Anya had a hand in making, even if you didn’t know it. As the Director of Brand and Creative Strategy at Duct Tape Then Beer, she does a little bit of: creative strategy, art direction, graphic design, film production, story development, photo editing, and whatever else needs to be done as part of a small team that makes two adventure podcasts (The Dirtbag Diaries and Safety Third, and films like Follow Through and Paul’s Boots.

Duct Tape Then Beer’s client list includes a lot of the biggest names in the outdoor industry: REI, Outdoor Research, Patagonia, The North Face, The Access Fund, Protect Our Winters, National Geographic, Black Diamond, Chaco, Arcteryx, Subaru, and others. I’ve been lucky to work with Anya on a short film project and see how she works (and how she draws), and why Fitz and Becca invited her to be part of their creative team.

I asked Anya to sit down for an interview a few weeks ago—here’s our conversation, edited for length:

ON GROWING UP IN CHATTANOOGA I’m the youngest of four kids. I was born in Canada in a small town called Hespler, Ontario. I have two sisters and a brother, and they are the best. My siblings really shaped my ideas of what I thought was cool, what I wanted to do with my life. Be good at school. Be Good at sports. Be able to talk with anyone with curiosity. I always wanted to do everything that they did. My brother says that my super power is absorbing other people’s super powers. I think of it more as just learning from rad people.

My parents were divorced when I was five — it was a really rough relationship and so I was a pretty stressed out kid. When I was twelve, my mom decided to move from Canada back to her home town of Chattanooga, Tennessee. Moving to the South was probably one of the best things that happened in my life because it put me in a more nature-focused place. In Canada, we lived in a small old town with stone buildings and neighborhoods full of kids. Getting outside meant going to the local school and hitting a tennis ball up against a giant brick wall, cruising on bikes in the street or watching my brother and his friends skateboard in the Taco Bell parking lot. When I moved to Tennessee, we moved in with my grandmother, Gigi, who was like a second mom to me. She lived on a small acreage that had been part of her family farm for three generations. She lived and passed on the same plot of land where she was born — so land was important. There were tomato plants, frogs, lightning bugs, fresh mint and magnolia trees — space to just run around. We were close to a lake, so I would run down there to feed ducks and swim.

There were a lot less kids nearby, so I spent a lot of time with my sister Michaela and Gigi outside — working in the yard, playing checkers and drinking sun tea. Moving to Tennessee really set a different tone for the rest of my growing up and for my life.

My family was not an outdoor adventure family at all. My mom was a single parent with four kids, so she got us into as many organized sports programs as possible to deal with our energy levels and probably just to free up some personal time for her.

I did gymnastics, played soccer and tennis and eventually got into diving. Those sports were great for strength and discipline, but I experienced a lot of injury in high school, specifically in soccer. It seemed like I was working really hard athletically, only to then be at the mercy of some overly aggressive hack on the field.

I broke my leg the summer before senior year of high school and basically was just done with soccer — I hated every bit of it at that point, so I washed my hands of team sports. My sister was a pro cyclist at the time and gave me her old aluminum Trek 1500 and I started riding all the time. It changed my idea of distance and freedom. At this point, I was figuring out where I wanted to go to university. I hadn’t ever even been west of the Mississippi at that point — but somehow I thought that I where I wanted to be.

[photo by Anne Cleary]

ON MOVING OUT WEST There was an image — and this does not sound that deep at all, but it was an image the old rubber-banded Patagonia Capilene packaging. Steph Davis was climbing some crack. I had never rock climbed in my life and I didn’t know who Steph Davis was at the time, but what I saw was just a super-strong female and she had chalk on her face and her hair was whipping in the wind. Didn’t look perfect, looked like she was trying hard in a wild place, and I wondered where she was. I was inspired by her, but I was also inspired by the place and the sea of rock she was moving through. I’d never been to a place so arid or stoic.

None of my family lived out west then. All of my siblings were either still in Canada or in the southeast. I just thought the west seemed amazing. I was the last of four siblings at home, and I made no secret of the fact that I wanted to go far away, not have a support network and just see how it would go.

I remember sending away to University of Colorado and getting this information packet that had a VHS tape in it. I wish I still had it! It was so ridiculous. It had 80s synth music and this dude rollerblade shredding around the campus, giving a sort of tour. It wasn’t a causal rollerblade tour. The guy was getting rad on campus and pointing out different buildings! As I said, I was kind of a stressed out kid in school. I made straight A’s and was valedictorian. From that rollerblading video, I guess it seemed like CU was a good place for a stressed out, sometimes-too-serious kid to go.

So I applied the School of Environmental Design and Architecture, and went.

ON DRAWING I can’t remember not drawing. I was always drawing things. In hindsight, I probably just should’ve gotten an art degree. But I think when I was making the college decision, all of my siblings were sociology majors or history majors, which can be cryptic majors to develop a career from. I think I went into school with a practical driven idea that I would know exactly what I was going to do when I got out of school if it killed me.

Considering the different programs that CU offered, it looked like their environmental design program was good. It focused on sustainable architecture and reuse of old buildings, which I was interested in — my mom collected antiques and love making old things new. Plus, I thought architecture was practical. Theoretically, that major equals a decently clear career path after school. Maybe almost too clear of a path — it can be hard to stray from.

I was always drawing as a kid. I remember getting Calvin and Hobbes cartoon books for holidays. I’d go through the pages and duplicate all of the cartoons, hundreds of them. I didn’t trace them — I just redrew them identically, right down to the word bubbles and writing. I did that with Snoopy, Garfield and Far Side comics, too. I really liked cartoons in general. They were funny, they had a dry sense of humor that reminded me of my brother. He cultivated my sense of humor, for sure. He helped explain some of the more complex cartoons and cultural concepts in them.

I would draw on my own, too. For hours at a time. Sharks and birds. My own hands. I’d look at magazine covers and draw them. Time magazine’s person of the year. National Geographic — that woman with the crazy aqua eyes. There were a bunch of skateboard magazines sitting around the house — my brother was a skateboarder. I’d try to redraw the Thrasher logo, which is a really tricky logo to redraw, by the way! I liked looking at that stuff because it seemed raw and cool, for whatever reason.

ON FINDING CLIMBING My first time climbing was on Flagstaff in Boulder. The granodiorite up there is this weird conglomerate rock — it is pretty grippy until its little embedded pebbles get polished. I remember just thinking how cool it was up there. It was so accessible! And at that point, it was pretty quiet there. I lived close to the trails, so I could jog up Flag. I loved that I could go whenever I wanted to. Even at night. I didn’t have a car in university. I didn’t have a car in high school, either, so I fell in love with things that I could do right out of my door with little equipment or support from anyone.

Climbing wasn’t like skiing or snowboarding — you needed a good chunk of money and a car to do those things. Climbing, and bouldering in particular, was something that I could walk out my door, do on my own and have complete control over my experience. With team sports, I couldn’t control my experience. It felt like other people could injure me. At least I had (kind of) had control over whether I hurt myself.

The transition from bouldering to tying into a rope was pretty quick for me. I ended up stumbling into a really good group of people that were better climbers than I was. Probably within the first few months of climbing, I drove with them out to Wild Iris. I remember not really understanding the concept of grades that much, just deciding what I wanted to try based on aesthetics and the encouragement of my friends. I’d say, “That thing looks good! I’ll try that.” It was really important to me to know that my friends believe in me. They did, and I got better quickly.

It was within the first month of climbing that I wanted to try to lead something. Everything about the sport was exciting — I just wanted something of my own. And it seemed like something I could have, in terms of just being able to develop my skills at whatever pace I wanted. I climbed so much (and probably so badly) when I started that I constantly had injured fingers and weeping skin.

[photo by Anne Cleary]

ON HER FIRST JOB After graduation, the job market was okay. I wanted to stay in Boulder for a little bit. Right out of school, I got a job at a small, residential architecture firm. They were modern and fun and also did a bit of branding and graphic design for the buildings they made. That rollerblade video was full of shit — I worked my ass off in school. I could have gotten a job at a bigger, better-paying firm, but a smaller shop felt more ‘me’. A lot of people in my class were going to giant corporate firms down in Denver or other cities, but I was more interested in smaller scale residential design — and I was more interested in working closely with clients and staying close to the mountains.

That shop was a safe place to escape to after being intense (again) throughout school. I didn’t want to jump into a high-intensity job. There, I got exposed to graphic design, brand design and architecture. They did a lot of the drawing by hand, which I loved. Right then, things were teetering on being all computer-based. Eventually, we did take all drawings into the computer, but all of the concept iteration was hand-drawn. All of the renderings were hand-drawn, which I got to do and loved.

ON LEAVING BOULDER The person I was dating at the time is now my husband, and I think after about a year in Boulder, Charlie and I were pretty ready to take off. We decided to take a trip to South America, go to Chile and Argentina to go snowboarding and skiing down there.

We were at a resort called Las Leñas, which has an amazing zone of lift-access / assisted backcountry. One day, Charlie and I were riding separately. It was really crap conditions and I kind of got off my line and was a bit lost. I saw these people just beyond me on this plateau with sastrugi all over it. It was sunny, but windy, like hard-to-move type wind. And I remember seeing a few people and thinking, “They look like Americans,” I screamed out to them, “Hey, can I ride with you guys?”

So we basically get together on that random plateau in Argentina. Maura Mack, her husband Jason, and Adam DesLauriers. We rode a shitty, icy line together and had a hilarious experience in super bad conditions. We got down and decided to go get beers and hamburgers and meet up with their buds, Lel Tone and Tom Wayes. Charlie joined us at the end of the day, and we all went to a hot spring and had non-stop, hilarious conversations. They felt like our people and they told us we should move to Tahoe. A week after we got back from Argentina, we decided to go to Tahoe and check it out. They set us up with a place to live, I got an architecture job, and Charlie started working at Granite Chief, tuning skis. Plus, it was only a short drive from Bishop. I was sold.

ON MEETING FITZ AND BECCA CAHALL That first year in Tahoe, I spent a lot of time in this really tiny climbing gym, if you could even call it that. The Sports Exchange in Truckee. It was really just a used gear shop that had a room in the back with some holds on a woody. But I spent a ton of time there, looking for friends like those I had left in Boulder.

There weren’t a ton of women climbing in there. I saw Becca Cahall — she was strong and I decided, “That girl’s gonna be my friend.” I like to say that I ‘picked her up in the climbing gym’. We started talking, I met Fitz, and Charlie and I started going over to their place in Kings Beach every week for dinner. Becs makes a mean lasagna. It’s amazing at that point in time in my life how much time I had — or made — to connect and chat with people.

We started climbing with those two. At the time, I think Fitz was in the very early stages of starting The Dirtbag Diaries and he was doing a bunch of writing for print publications. Becca was often gone during the summers, doing field biology work in Oregon. And Fitz and I would climb a good bit together in the summers when she was gone. The friendship really started from there.

They moved to Corvallis, Oregon, for Becca’s graduate program. From there, they moved to Seattle. Charlie and I were still in Tahoe, but we kept in touch with those guys and saw them whenever they came through. We were in Tahoe for just over seven years and I was working at an architecture firm there. I was getting really tired of designing 3,000 square foot “cabins” for people from the Bay Area. Architecture was barely providing a living in a mountain town that’s difficult to make a living in. But it wasn’t really filling me up creatively.

Charlie was tending bar, skiing a bunch and tuning skis — at some point, he wanted more of an intellectual pursuit. He started looking around at programs to get his MBA. He was interested in getting into the creation ski clothing and technical outerwear. We were poking around for schools for him — we chose Seattle because of its creative opportunities and proximity to mountains. He had also grown up in Washington, so family was a draw. It was a huge benefit that Becca and Fitz had already made camp here.

Charlie got into the University of Washington and I found a really great position at a firm called Graham Baba Architects. I basically walked into a dream job in an outrageously bad job market. So it just seemed like everything fell into place. Then I found myself in the city. I never really thought I would live in a city, but all of a sudden, I was.

Pretty soon after we moved to the city, I convinced Charlie to take half of a year of his MBA program and in France. So I took an eight-month sabbatical from the architecture firm, even though I hadn’t really been there that long. I spent the season climbing in Fontainebleau. We lived in the 11th in Paris, and traveled around to Italy and Switzerland to do some climbing and snow sports.

ON CANCER When we got back from Europe, I ended up getting a rash all over my body. I thought I had developed a food allergy, so I went to a doctor and I went to a naturopath to get tested for food allergies.

She said, “No, sweetie, you don’t have an allergy. You have bed bugs.” They were pretty common in France at that time, come to find out. She told me how to get rid of them and offered to do my annual exam while I was there (she was a nurse practitioner, too). She does a breast exam on me and she says she feels something. A lump. I could tell she felt like it was bad. She said, “I think you should go get this checked out.” For whatever reason, I just knew there was something wrong. I hadn’t been feeling well, but I couldn’t really attribute anything. Had I not brought those bed bugs back from Europe, I might not have found the tumor. I fucking love bed bugs.

So the very next day I got in for a biopsy at one of the cancer centers in Seattle, and it came back as Triple Negative Breast Cancer. That’s an invasive form of breast cancer. All at once and very quickly, things slowed down for me and sped up, if that makes any sense. I went through a series of tests to see what the extent of the cancer was — full body scans to see if it the cancer was anywhere else. Waiting for those results was terrifying. I was trying to figure out my course of treatment, and just trying to understand and grapple with everything.

I was whisked into chemotherapy, and that was a crazy, awful chunk of treatment. It stops all fast-growing cells — like cancer — from producing in your body. That’s why your hair falls out — your hair is fast-growing cell. I decided to take some control and shave my head before my hair really fell out. It just seemed like a helpless situation.

Can you believe that I had a wig made of my own hair? I had it made, and then I never wore it. Not once. It just sat on this weird styrofoam head in the corner of the bedroom the entire time. It was like this weird little animal sitting in the corner. I don’t know why I had it made. Like a security blanket, I think. When I put it on it felt like I was lying about what I was going through.

Chemotherapy just makes you feel acid washed from the inside out, but it’s what they said was the best and only treatment for my cancer type. Afterwards, I had surgery to take out the tumor, followed by radiation. You don’t fight cancer, you just weather it.

ON DECIDING TO SWITCH CAREERS Coming out of cancer, I realized that architecture wasn’t what I wanted to be doing. I wasn’t happy on a day-to-day basis. At that point, after all the cancer stuff, I realized I could pull the plug on architecture and not feel bad at all. I deeply realized that time is short and that I didn’t want to spend a single day doing something that I didn’t love. So I started looking around for other things.

I sat down with my pen and paper, as I usually do. I drew out my problem. I basically tried to draw an infographic of the things that I liked about architecture and the things that I didn’t. I mapped out all of the tasks that I did in between the beginning and end of an architecture project, starting from the first client meeting and ending with them moving into their new or redone house.

Overlayed on the project timeline, I drew an up-and-down heartbeat line. It trended up when I loved the project tasks, and it would go down when I really didn’t like what I was having to do. This line didn’t correlate to difficulty of task — all jobs have hard parts that need grit to get through. True. But this helped me understand what I didn’t like and why.

When I looked at my infographic of my life, it seemed like such a small portion of every project had a loving heartbeat line. The ratio of I love this to I really don’t was just not enough. This visual helped me communicate with people that I was having coffee chats or meeting with, exploring new careers and positions. I could point to the graphic and say these are the things that I’m doing in every project that A) I really excel at and B) fill me up emotionally and really satisfy me as a professional and a creator. Clear, insightful visuals are so key to having good conversations.

I met with a guy who worked at a brand agency. He said, “You really seem like a creative strategist or a brand strategist.” I said, “Okay cool — what is that?” Basically, a strategist makes creative plans and develops foundational ideas that give meaning and inspiration to projects. Strategy helps teams of understand and fulfill creative goals. I wasn’t sure I understood it at first, but I finally had a job title to search for online. I didn’t even know that job existed.

So I started looking for jobs as a creative strategist. I came across an internship that was being offered. This job was definitely aimed at someone ten years younger than me. It was at brand and design firm here in Seattle called Hornall Anderson. Basically, I took my infographic and my architecture portfolio into the interview. I got the job.

[photo by Ken Etzel]

ON HOW BRAND STRATEGY RELATES TO ARCHITECTURE Essentially, I figured out that creating a house or a space for somebody to use is really similar to creating a brand. In the beginning of an architecture project, you meet the people that you’re going to be working with, the people that will live in that house. You understand how they want to live, the types of spaces they’ll need for their specific lifestyle. You understand the land they have to build on, whether it’s really hilly or flat. You understand the adjacent buildings and you decide how you want your building to respond to those around it. Stand out? Fit in? Be crazy or subdued? Be earthy or modern? You consider budget and you consider the builders that will actually create building. You chart a creative course.

At the end of the day, that planning process that I learned in architecture can be applied to almost any creative project, especially brands. You take a brand. You look at the landscape — where is it going to sit? You understand the brands that sit around it. You consider how your brand is going to respond to, compliment or go against those adjacent brands. You learn about the people that will be ‘living in that brand’ — the people that are running it and the people that will be purchasing its goods. You set a creative intention that helps develop a solid plan for your building or your brand. Or solid plan for making a film. Or an advertising campaign. Or an event. Whatever that is, there can always be a front-end structuring and creative process that helps you launch into ‘making’ in a considered, intentional and (hopefully) unique way.

ON DOING AN INTERNSHIP IN THE MIDDLE OF HER CAREER I got the internship and it was three months long — terrible pay, of course. But I learned a lot. I had also been in the professional world for ten years at that point. I got hired the day my internship ended, and started working as a Brand and Creative Strategist.

The internship was definitely a proxy for going back to school. I’d definitely recommend it. That job gave me amazing experience and mentors. There, I was able to develop my own techniques of working through brand problems with large teams. Strategists shape clear creative ideas so that it is easier for multiple people to express them.

ON JOINING DUCT TAPE THEN BEER I worked at Hornall for several years. It was the type of agency that had ping pong tables and kegs of beer and free cereal for breakfast. All of those things meant that they wanted you to never leave! I worked a ton, my climbing dropped off. I felt pretty unhealthy. Creatively, I was producing a lot of awesome stuff, working with big brands and talented designers — but eventually it felt a bit soulless. You can only use your intelligence and creativity to sell potato chips for so long.

I wanted to be climbing more. Through those first six years in Seattle, I was of course hanging out with Becca and Fitz. We loved talking about professional and creative stuff. I was always tracking on what Duct Tape Then Beer was doing. One night, I went over to their house and held a little facilitated visual Post-It party to chat with them about creative goals, what they were working on and what they wanted to be. At this point, they had positioned themselves pretty squarely as a film production company and of course The Dirtbag Diaries were still going strong.

When I was at that large agency, I saw people making films and content for brands in categories other than the outdoor industry. I saw how campaigns were being created and how solid, unique creative was being monetized. Basically, I wanted to help Duct Tape expand what they offered. People were coming to Duct Tape saying: We want a film. And then Fitz and Becca would ask: What do you need a film about and why? The brands rarely had good or solid answers for these questions. Maybe they didn’t actually need a film — maybe the brand actually needed a perspective.

Essentially, Duct Tape Then Beer had been creating emotional, unique perspectives for brands and expressing them in films. The value though, for the first years, had been being placed on the film outcome rather than the strategy and thinking that needs to be done before a good story is told.

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ON WHAT SHE DOES AT DUCT TAPE THEN BEER Fitz and Becca told me they thought they could hire me. That was a big deal. I was really wary of working with good friends. I had always kept my personal life and work pretty separate. I just didn’t want to ruin our friendship by working together every single day, or having weird professional interactions with folks that I love so much. Eventually, those guys just talked me down from the ledge. They said their first priority was keeping our friendship solid — and they thought we could make some really cool things together. They said we would only work with brands and strengthen and nurture connections to the natural world. They said I could go climbing. That was it. I ended up leaving the big agency and joining Duct Tape to develop a brand strategy offering so that we could answer the brand questions before the topic of the creative output was even addressed.

Before a creative expression (film, messaging, campaign) is ever decided upon, we crystallize emotional ideas that will elicit action. How will we express an emotional idea? Maybe a film. Maybe a podcast. Maybe new headlines or messaging that gets rolled out over a few years. Maybe a social media campaign. Maybe an event. But we always start with clear, emotional ideas.

There aren’t many projects that come through Duct Tape Then Beer that I don’t have some sort of hand in. But you could say that about all of us — we all touch every project. Our skills overlap and are complementary. I make all of the pitch decks. I don’t like to admit that I am a writer — it was always so hard for me — but it has flowed as I’ve gotten older. If it’s a story that Fitz discovered, he’ll write it up and then I design a compelling story deck — sometimes with infographics — to get our ideas across. I do a lot of strategy work for us internally and for our clients. I do the graphic design and edit the photos that come out of our office, functioning as the art director and social media person. But my official title is Director of Brand and Creative Strategy.

Our podcasts need a good bit of overarching creative strategy. We don’t just haphazardly assort stories and guests. We look at culture and we try to understand what’s going on and try to actively seek out stories that express complex, emotional topics in today’s world. I’ll work to help shape this topic mix.

At the helm of Duct Tape, we’ve got five full-time people. We are all seasoned creatives and high-functioning human beings that love to contribute and work hard for each other. I think that’s what makes project good — when several smart people contribute in a considered way.

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ON SNOWBOARDING VS. SKIING I snowboard. I skied when I was tiny in Canada a couple of times. Since being in Colorado, I’ve been a snowboarder. More and more, I stay out of resorts and am loyal to my splitboard and to snow that makes no noise. I’ve had three torn ACLs on one leg. I’ve torn my meniscus three times. So yea, I ride snow that makes no noise. Luckily, soft snow is usually easy to find in Washington.

ADVICE It was scary and hard for me to leave behind a profession that I’d put a lot of time and energy into. But I knew, deep down, that I didn’t enjoy it. My advice? Take some time and be really honest with yourself about what you like doing (and why) and what you don’t like doing (and why). Because every job is going to have something that sucks about it. Really anything worth doing is going to be pretty hard at some point, so the answer, “I don’t like doing this because it’s too hard,” is bullshit.

But I do recommend that process that I went through. Visually mapping out what filled me up emotionally and what depleted me emotionally. Visualizing that was so helpful. And clear. And it helped me realize what I wanted to be spending my time doing. Continually revisiting those two questions: What do I like doing and why? What do I not like doing and why? Continually revisiting those has been the most helpful thing for me over the last ten years.

The post Anya Miller On Climbing, Cancer, And Creative Strategy appeared first on semi-rad.com.

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olivereliott · 5 years

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Anya Miller On Climbing, Cancer, And Creative Strategy

I asked Anya to sit down for an interview a few weeks ago—here’s our conversation, edited for length:

[photo by Anne Cleary]

So I applied the School of Environmental Design and Architecture, and went.

[photo by Anne Cleary]

[photo by Ken Etzel]

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mrwilliamcharley · 5 years

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Will Frith: The Sprudge Twenty Interview

Will Frith (Photo by Huynh Nguyen Tan Phat)

Welcome to the Sprudge Twenty interviews presented by Pacific Barista Series! Read more about the Sprudge Twenty and see all of our interviews here.

Nominated by Elizabeth Chai

Will Frith is a career coffee professional working to “change the way the world sees Vietnamese coffee.” Frith has roots in the American Pacific Northwest, working for companies including Batdorf & Bronson, Olympia Coffee Roasting Company, and Modbar. Today he is based in Ho Chi Minh City, where his work includes training and education for the city’s booming coffee scene, the development of his own concept cafe project, and a wide-reaching green coffee initiative built around introduction arabica varieties to a region traditionally known for robusta. Sprudge has covered Frith’s work in Vietnam since 2013, and we spoke with him digitally for this Sprudge Twenty interview, presented by Pacific Barista Series.

What issue in coffee do you care about most?

I care most about addressing the inequities throughout the supply chain—what people are paid for their work; access to information, resources, and community—and customer experience (also throughout the supply chain).

What cause or element in coffee drives you?

Caffeine and flavor are the elements in coffee that drive me! But seriously: fairness, developing potential, and sustainability.

What issue in coffee do you think is critically overlooked?

The fact that the people are the most important element, at every step, involved in producing the coffee experience for the consumer. It only takes one misstep, bad actor, or flippant comment to ruin the entire experience.

What is the quality you like best about coffee?

It brings people from many levels in society together. The enjoyment of good coffee (not limited to specialty or “third wave”) is something that anyone can access.

Did you experience a “god shot” or life-changing moment of coffee revelation early in your career?

Coffee and my passion for it revealed itself slowly over the course of many smaller great experiences. I can’t really narrow it down to a single beverage or time. The people who supported me, provided guidance, and shared their experience all worked together to provide a long-term, ongoing series of revelations that continue to inspire and drive me.

What is your idea of coffee happiness?

A quiet, slow morning with a cool, light breeze and a great view. A warm cup of filter coffee, nothing too fancy. Could be something great, could be something mediocre, as long as the moment itself is great.

If you could have any job in the coffee industry, what would it be and why?

Coffee Idea Person, a job where people come to me with coffee problems and I help to solve them, and I have a team of people to design and produce any gadgetry that I think up. It would be sort of what I do already, without all the hardest stuff. I really like what I already do, I just wish it was easier sometimes.

Who are your coffee heroes?

Trish Rothgeb (Wrecking Ball), Carmel Laurino (Kalsada), Oliver Stormshak (Olympia Coffee), Andrea Allen (Onyx Coffee), and Fuadi Pitsuwan (Beanspire).

If you could drink coffee with anyone, living or dead, who would it be and why?

My maternal grandparents, who passed away a few years ago. Before they died I hadn’t had a chance to master their language sufficiently to really get to know them. They both had incredible lives, lived through war, poverty, migration. They were rice farmers with a typically huge family in the Mekong delta. I really would just want to know what their lives were like, what kinds of things they thought about when they weren’t immediately concerned with survival.

If you didn’t get bit by the coffee bug, what do you think you’d be doing instead?

Renewable energy and water reclamation are two subjects that have really captured my attention, but I haven’t made the kind of time needed to really dive deep into those things. I find them just as compelling as I do coffee, and if I spend the rest of my life in the coffee industry, I know I’ll eventually learn more about them. But my interest in these things definitely came as result of working in coffee…

Do you have any coffee mentors?

My heroes are also sort of my mentors (whether they volunteered to be or not). The people I’ve had the most formal mentorship-like relationships with have been Oliver Stormshak (Olympia Coffee) and Quang Nhat Trang (La Viet)—but these have been sort of co-mentoring relationships as well.

What do you wish someone would’ve told you when you were first starting out in coffee?

I think people might have even told me, but I was too immature to listen: slow down, focus on one thing at a time, and don’t try to do everything all at once.

Name three coffee apparatuses you’d take into space with you.

A duffel bag full of tasty instant coffee, a way to make ice, and a way to heat water.

Best song to brew coffee to:

Silly Love Songs, by Wings.

Look into the crystal ball—where do you see yourself in 20 years?

Using my experience in coffee growing areas to help other coffee growing areas address climate change. I’ll know my way around robusta as well as I do arabica, and will have been able to apply that learning to the problem of the climate crisis. Also it would be really cool to figure out how to grow robusta that tastes really great in the United States, because in 20 years our time may be up as an industry focused on special, far-away coffees cultivated with cheap labor.

What’d you eat for breakfast this morning?

Coffee. I’ve been playing with intermittent fasting (intermittently), and today was a fasting day.

When did you last drink coffee?

This morning, about an hour ago.

What was it?

An arabica blend from “Uncle” Son, who grows, processes, and roasts coffee in Dalat. I made an iced pour-over.

Thank you.

The Sprudge Twenty is presented by Pacific Barista Series. For a complete list of 2019 Sprudge Twenty honorees please visit sprudge.com/twenty

Zachary Carlsen is a co-founder and editor at Sprudge Media Network. Read more Zachary Carlsen on Sprudge.

The post Will Frith: The Sprudge Twenty Interview appeared first on Sprudge.

from Sprudge http://bit.ly/2DFcpEl

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click2watch · 5 years

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Fidelity Crypto Chief Says Hard Fork May Delay Firm’s Support for Ethereum

Fidelity Digital Assets (FDAS) will take its time about adding support for ethereum, the executive in charge of the new platform said.

The digital asset trading and custody branch of Fidelity Investments, which went live this quarter, has developed an internal framework for evaluating any cryptocurrencies that may be added in the future, according to FDAS president Tom Jessop.

While Jessop has previously said FDAS might look to add ether and other cryptocurrencies, he told CoinDesk Thursday that the process to do so may not be cut-and-dried.

“We’re currently supporting bitcoin, we have designs to support other coins over the balance of the year center to various criteria including our [in-house selection framework], where we obviously look … at client demand and other things,” he said.

This framework looks at how decentralized a coin is, what the client demand looks like and whether there are any “peculiarities about the protocol” which would make it difficult to launch or continue to support a given cryptocurrency on FDAS’ platform.

And, so far at least, client demand has correlated tightly with market capitalization, Jessop said.

“We will probably go in market cap order, that’s where the demand is but it doesn’t mean that we will list every coin,” he said. “There may be reasons why we [won’t list] a coin that have nothing to do with quite frankly client [demand].”

As one example, Jessop pointed to ethereum, currently the second-largest cryptocurrency by market cap. He explained:

“We’d love to have support [for] ether but you know you have a hard fork coming up and some upgrades, so I think we’re trying to see how those things work out before we make a decision to put them on the platform.”

The recent Constantinople hard fork implemented a number of upgrades to ethereum, including lowering the ether block reward, as well as a few other technical changes; another one called Istanbul is tentatively expected in October.

Part of the challenge is in ensuring that FDAS can protect investors, Jessop said. He cited another cryptocurrency, ethereum classic, as an example of a project that would require an in-depth risk assessment due to the 51 percent attack the protocol suffered earlier this year.

Jessop did not provide any sort of timeline for when new assets might be added to the platform.

Goals for 2019

Looking ahead, Jessop said FDAS plans to scale its business over the rest of 2019, and wants to cover 90 percent of its market in the U.S. by the end of the year.

This scaling will include both securing regulatory approvals, such as money service business licences, as well as continuing to work out any possible bugs in the platform at present.

“Despite crypto winter, the market is still pretty robust and so we’re excited about that,” he said, adding:

“The [goal for the] rest of the year is scale the business in terms of adding new clients [and] expanding the scope for offering trading execution services … we can we say we’re live [but] it’s also a function honestly of where we have jurisdictional authority to operate.”

While Jessop declined to say which states FDAS currently has licenses in – or even how many – he said it is “a reasonable number,” and the firm is continuing to work on acquiring licenses through the rest of the year.

“We’re still in the process of collecting licenses to do business in multiple jurisdictions,” he said, but “we’re very encouraged [by] the progress we’ve made so far.”

Moreover, he added, “we continue to pursue status as a qualified custodian and … that’s still in sight for this year and it’s really been a priority we have.”

While FDAS is looking to secure state-level licenses, Jessop did note that the company is prioritizing the states which have larger market shares, rather than focusing on every state at once.

Client interest

Fidelity has seen “a significant amount of demand” since its announcement in October, Jessop told CoinDesk, with a wide variety of firms expressing interest: everyone from dedicated crypto funds to hedge funds, family offices, intermediaries and even individuals looking to launch their own private fund products based on crypto have reached out.

FDAS has also received interest from exchanges hoping to offer clients custody through Fidelity, Jessop said.

“I know in terms of [assets under management] … it’s anywhere from like low single-digit millions up to tens if not hundreds of millions,” he said of the potential business from this channel.

The company surveyed various types of funds as well, finding that interest in crypto investment has remained “consistent” across the different types. Jessop explained:

“We’ve still seen consistent interest from institutions, I think largely because institutions have been doing their homework and returned to understand the space, and quite frankly wouldn’t make a decision to invest at any price until they really understood their own personal [investment] theses.”

Included in Fidelity’s survey were some number of pension funds, and while some have asked questions about allocating capital, Jessop said he does not see any others actually committing funds to the asset class (apart from a previously announced investment by a Virginia county retirement fund in a Morgan Creek vehicle).

Tom Jessop photo by Nikhilesh De for CoinDesk

This news post is collected from CoinDesk