On Vacation

  It has been pretty long since I've updated this blog but that is since i'm on summer vacation. The first two months of my vacation was pretty wasted, I was at home and was studying for my violin exam. It's good that i passed it, another step to success. Now i'm at Malaysia, my home country, everything's great in a way, like I get to play with fireworks and see my relatives. I got a good break from electronics and most especially internet. For the past time, i've been using my cousins laptop or visiting internet cafes. Well that's pretty much it, i'm having plenty of fun, fasting along with others for Ramadan and celebration is coming for Eid. Once i'm back in Dubai, i'll be updating, continuing on the book 'Nudge.'

Ion Magnet Wristbands

   Magnetic accessories are thought to have special properties to help bring an active lifestyle or cool down head-aches. An ion wristband is commonly seen on professional sports athletes, especially golfers. What do these wristbands do or give? There are supposed to be magnets on the wristband which stabilizes the amount of ion charge in your body. It is said that it helps stop head-aches and that it gives an edge in sports. I have a Trion:Z wristband and it's pretty nice. It is black and red with a magnet on the top and bottom of the wristband, opposite sides. I can't say for sure that this wristband improves performance but it sure is a comfortable thing to wear on your wrist. The special property is probably a lore but there is definitely something going on. I'm sure it does help sharpen your mind up and in turn that helps to improve performance. Just like how people say looking at an emerald heals your eyes, an ion wristband can bring an active lifestyle. There is a sense to both, our eyes naturally relax and stress less to the color green, this is a fact. An emerald is a beautiful green gemstone and that is probably why people say that. Ion wristbands have magnets which collaborate with each other and probably does something. Well, for a conclusion, ion wristbands probably do assist you in a healthy lifestyle and it also looks very nice and sporty!

Trion:Z wristband from the United Arab Emirates.

New Look!

 Well, I have been going through a series of updates to enhance your experience on this blog. Firstly, I made a new striking title using Art Text 2 for Mac. Secondly, I made it easier for people to follow this blog, right through e-mail, just enter your e-mail address on the 'follow by e-mail' bar. Lastly, I have added a viewable analytic for everyone to view for fun. I'm trying to connect my Youtube account to this blog therefore making it easier to view my videos. If you haven't already, please check out my Youtube channel!

My Youtube Channel!

E-mail me suggestions: My e-mail!

Mac OS X Lion Review

  The company, 'Apple' recently released their new operating system, 'Mac OS X Lion.' It is available for purchase on the Application Store on all Mac computers for $29.99. It can also be bought at the Apple store or retailers for $49.99 which includes a USB. Lion is an upgrade to the previous OS, Snow Leopard. Upgrading would result in the new 10.7 update. What features do you get from this? Well, you receive three new things on your dock, Launchpad, Mission Control, and Facetime. This update involves many changes in design, in fact, it was inspired by Ipad/Iphone/Itouch. Launchpad gives you the springboard look of the Ipad, Mission Control shows you all the applications that are on, in an all in one look. Facetime is exactly the same thing as the facetime in the Ipad 2, Iphone, and Ipod Touch 4, it is a video calling application. Along with that, speeds are slightly faster as it neatly cleans your Mac. The touch gestures for your trackpad are revamped and new. It takes time to get used to the new movements but it seems better in a way. One thing that I appreciate is the new full screen features in selected programs. Your photo-booth is totally fullscreen and same goes with you Safari browser! There is also a new feature called 'AirDrop' which allows Lion to Lion  Macs to share files instantly and easy. You can see my video that I made whilst downloading OS X Lion, a day after the release, it shows the important features and is best of all, a commentary!

NOTE: This video is fully created by me and is therefore mine! 

Final Showdown

  Early morning on Friday 22nd of July, 2011, my mother brought me to her class at American University of Sharjah. She is a professor there in MIS but she wanted to show me a footwear company project that her masters students in the school of engineering were working on. There were three teams and they presented information on their product and why customers and investors should choose them. My mom invited two guest judges from the MBA program to help make the final decision on who was the best. I was just there to witness this event and to see how things run in a college. The first team was very professional and handed out folders and water bottles with their logo on it,' Pulse.' They designed a shoe with a specialty called 'Zigtech' which brought balance to every step you take and rippled around your whole foot. The team brought a great mixture of explanation and presentation. The slide shows were interesting and gave a promotion to exercising as the shoe was specified for running, in what I saw. The second team was called 'Jowati' and this was my favorite team, mainly because they were interesting to watch. They put humor along with information on their product. The group, mainly consisting of Emarati locals, associated the royal families in assisting their product mainly with funds. This in turn could help them in the future to market their product internationally. At the end of their presentation, they handed out delicious cupcakes imprinted with Jowati shoes, they also gave keychains, pens, notepads, and personally to my mother and I, a Jowati T-Shirt for my baby sister and me. This team had something different from the other teams, they uploaded a video on Youtube, this is a rather excellent choice to promote a product. They received lots of feedback on their product along with their saying 'Share your dreams with us.' In all, I favored that team the most. The last team which is team three, was a very informative team. They did lots of explaining and were really deep with their product. Their idea seemed wonderful but there was a lack of presentation. Even so, they also did something different, they had an activity. In the middle of the presentation, they distributed hand-outs to everyone with two groups to keep in mind, buyers and investors. The buyers were told on the benefits and features of the shoe whilst the investors were told why you should spend on them. This group was formal, in fact, they even served food in a 'lunch break.' All of the teams were excellent in my opinion and i really enjoyed visiting the university, I learned a lot. Everyone did amazing though some could improve, of course, but it was a hard decision to select the winner of the 'Showdown.' Anyways, the teams put lots of effort and you can even see it for yourself if you were there, congratulations to all!

Jowati Youtube Video: Click Here

IOS 4.3.4 And Others Jailbreak via Redsn0w

  This guide is for educational purposes only!

   As you know, many hackers found ways to hack your Iphone/Ipod Touch/Ipad (1 & 2). What is jailbreaking and what does it do? Let's break the words up, Jail-Break. Jail is locked up and break is freedom. Break free from jail, get freedom from being locked. Here are the main reasons people jailbreak their devices:
- Custom themes, lock-screens, sounds, symbols, and sliders.
- Free games from Cydia or free application store games from Installous.
- Tweaks, changes, extra-columns, shortcuts, and 'hotkeys.'
- Free music, ringtones, and camera enhancing.

  That's the main reason people jailbreak their devices but its not all fun and games for those people, there is a down-side. Once jailbroken, synchronizing to Itunes or updating your firmware will delete the jailbreak and everything you got from it. After this you could always re-jailbreak but its tiresome. Okay, to learn how to jailbreak and to get started, all you need is your Iphone/Ipod Touch/Ipad (1 or 2) and your white charger cable to connect to your computer. This jailbreak is from Redsn0w and can be used for IOS 4.3.4 or any other firmware before that, just select the firmware below:

• First select your firmware: Select your Firmware

• Then visit Redsn0ws official website to either downgrade your firmware or download the jailbreak: The Website to Download Jailbreak

• Lastly follow and read these guidelines: This jailbreak is free and once you download it, follow the instructions, no surveys or gimmicks. Instructions below:

   - Turn off your Iphone/Itouch/Ipad then click 'Next/Proceed.'
   - Then hold the power button at the top for the stated amount of seconds.
   - Without releasing the power button, hold the home button for the stated amount of seconds.
   - Release the power button but hold the home button or vice versa.
Remember: Just read the instructions on what it says, it's fairly easy. These instructions are to guide you on what to expect.

Hopefully you enjoyed this guide on jailbreaks, explore because there are many things to be found!

Nudge: Choice Architecture

Chapter 5 (Conclusion to Part I)
Choice Architecture

   Choice Architecture brings the conclusion to the Part 1 of the book 'Nudge.' It starts out with an example from one of the authors, Thaler. He teaches at a college and the door to his classroom has a wooden handles. Instinctively, how would you open the door? You don't push handles, do you? You're supposed to grip the handle and pull it. The architecture for the big door confused many people because that door must be pushed. The natural way of thinking is to push a door when leaving but with the handles, this could be an exception. Handles are meant to be pulled, so your mind tells you to pull open the door. But it doesn't budge, then you push the door, realizing your mistake you must feel pretty embarrassed. Especially this one student in Thalers class who pulled the door, truthfully it's pretty hard to tell whether to push or pull in this situation. This architecture doesn't follow the law of a psychological rule, 'Stimulus Response.'  What is your stimulus response? It is the way of something that you get used to. As we are humans, we err and make many mistakes in our lives, especially when we let our Automatic thinking take control. In order to combat this, more thoughtful people would consider the Reflective thinking for a rather thought of way. An example is saying what color one would see at your computer screen, sounds simple. Then add a the name of a different color like GREEN on a background color of blue. This will make you think more than if it wasn't there. I have a little test for you, follow the directions below:

- Tell me what color you see in thats shaded in the background but ignore the text (or try to), answer each question in three seconds (Do this fairly, you would just be cheating yourself if not). This test is created by me.

RED        


GREEN   


BLUE      


BLACK   


YELLOW


   Lets spice things up a bit, tell me the color of the text, like what color it is but not what color it says.

BLUE      


PURPLE  


YELLOW


 Did you solve this? If so then kudos to you! It might not be hard if you take a glance at it but on real professional ones it would. This is just to give you a taste of what this is like. There is something exactly like this on 'Brain Age' for the Nintendo DS.

  No architecture has nudged so many people in the world than Amsterdams 'Fly in the Urinal.' It is very effective and stopped 80% of spillage in bathrooms. Cleaners must've complained of the amount of spillage in bathrooms and eventually engineer Doug Kempel experimented with a fly sticker and put it on the urinal. Later he brought it to the public and results were a hit! Orders were made online for this fly sticker and were used in schools, libraries, and mostly airports. Lousy aiming was stopped when the fly was spotted on the urinal, it sounds funny but was a major success. Doug specifically said," My goal is nothing less than to save the world, one urinal at a time." Well his goal is working and this fly sticker is seen commonly in America, Moscow, Holland, Singapore and many other countries. 80% less spillage is a lot, really!

  Defaults are something that is already there if nothing is custom or selected. As the Automatic thinking side is stronger and more powerful than our reflective side, we tend to like defaults. How does the automatic thinking function the way we like defaults? Lets look at the facts of behavior analysis. But before we do that, what is behavior analysis? Behavior analysis is a type of psychology that is based on the behavior of something, mostly the way we humans act and behave. If you look at it in a way, behavior means the pattern or way one behaves whilst analysis means a study or to research. Now back to the question, automatic thinking function the way we like defaults because we like things that require the least work possible. Who wouldn't like to get a million dollars or cash in seconds rather than in fifty-years. Defaults assist us in many ways, take the defaults of your computer or laptop. When you go to the bathroom, the computer will automatically dim the display light and eventually the screensaver will show or otherwise it would go to sleep. This is a default, very simple to understand. In full terms, the sub-heading is called 'Defaults: Padding The Path of Least Resistance.' Most people left the default like that, I doubt most people change their defaults for the computer. Another example of default is when we order food in a fast-food restaurant. The guy taking your order forgets to ask you for what drink you want and you also forget, by default you would a get Pepsi or cola. This happens because many people order their drink as cola and the waiters take it as the default.
 Expect error, a good architect would know that the building or things he designs or for humans and like I said before humans err. Like the chapter suggests, choice architecture must be well thought of. In America, drivers drive on the left-hand side whilst in the United Kingdom its the opposite. So to suit the safety of tourists and pedestrians, the city is well equipped with warnings. Bathrooms are great examples of expect error. Some people forget to flush (its true and disturbing), so automatic toilets fix that, some forget to turn off the water and others take too much paper towels, that it all fixed to meet the likings of everyone. The people who made this expected error. Maybe someone was focusing on something whilst on the toilet and forgot to flush, despite how you go to the bathroom, its different for others. Don't tell me you've never seen someones left-overs in the toilet before. In other situations, a business man is in a hurry and doesn't close the sink properly and it is dripping, automatic ones can fix that! Humans aren't perfect and we were never supposed to be, we help each other by seeing each others mistakes and hopefully the world would be a much better place, with less error.
 Giving feedback is essential to improving. If someone made a brand new 'Massive Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game (MMORPG),' then they would need feedback to improve and make it meet the likings of many people. This applies to mostly everything, giving feedback on how you study, look, or do things also count in. Restaurants need feedback because they have tough competition against others, that's why they usually give feedback cards after you finish your meal, to ask how it was. They value your feedback because if you didn't like something then maybe someone else didn't like it.
  Structure complex choices, when selecting something that is in a big number, you would want to get the best one. To find this, we use 'Elimination by aspects.' Say you wanted to rent a car, there are many cars out there but which one is the best suited with what you can afford. You eliminate some things first, if its above $50,000 then you won't buy it or if its a 4 seater than you won't get it. Select the features you want, $25,000, 7 seater, four-wheel drive, and the brand Toyota. The example from the chapter is similar but involves someone searching for apartments.

  That's it, you've survived Part I of Nudge, but its not finished yet. There are still 200+ pages to go but in all that brings the conclusion to basic thinking and we managed to learn some great vocabulary! Humans and Econs brought a great point and was an amazing part. Part II is detailed on wealth and will research further into behavior, in fact, its simply called,' Money.' Remember the description, improving decisions, about health, wealth, and happiness. Lets see if its concluded at the end of the book.

Fly in the Urinal, a big success!

Push or Pull?