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vikramrojo / gist:f78d3a3d52b2d4de5154
Last active August 29, 2015 14:19
Nietzsche principle of amor fati, or embracing one's fate.
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vikramrojo / gist:bad8daab837321dd1432
Created April 20, 2015 03:50
The patience to wait and the foresight to cash in
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vikramrojo / gist:895ebdf2ed81ec0d9c3e
Created April 20, 2015 04:01
Being polarizing wins over meh

The number of messages or interactions people get on OKCupid is highly correlated to the variance of their rankings. Profiles that were highly polarizing got about 70% more messages than average profiles. The same is true of societies rankings of beauty and competence. To get a middle ranking by polarization is extraordinary.

http://www.brainpickings.org/2014/10/13/dataclysm-christian-rudder-extraordinary/

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vikramrojo / gist:bcc36e0f321825b85c06
Last active August 29, 2015 14:19
The myth of brainstorming

Individuals are more productive than groups, especially large groups, it's shown that working alone is almost 30% more productive—but is it fun? “Group brainstorming, over a wide range of group sizes, inhibits rather than facilitates creative thinking.” It's not just that groups produce fewer ideas, they result in fewer good ideas. Equally so with suspending judgement vs critiquing at the end, while suspending judgement produces more ideas, both produce the same number of good results. Lastly, creativity is not original—ask a bunch of independent groups to brainstorm on the same topic and you will likely get many of the same ideas.

https://medium.com/galleys/brainstorming-does-not-work-6ad7b1448dcf

@vikramrojo
vikramrojo / gist:bb586a8aac6b75e70568
Created May 6, 2015 16:17
Why "everyone stereotypes" is dangerous

People are naturally defensive when their biases and prejuidices are highlighted, leading to the trend of softening the blow with "everyone stereotypes" sentiment. However, this is quite dangerous as it only reinforces the biases, after all, as humans, we're more likely to continue our behaviors if others act the same. Likewise statistics might skew behaviors, where showing inherent discrimination may either galvanize or encourage offender to continue their behaviors. Framing messages however towards a solution rather than an unwanted solution however might lead to desired outcomes—women deserve the same pay OR black people are just trying to live.

http://digest.bps.org.uk/2015/04/why-message-that-were-all-prone-to.html

@vikramrojo
vikramrojo / gist:40697f9e8d0fc5182332
Last active August 29, 2015 14:21
Candor in the creative process

A healthy creative culture requires the open sharing of ideas, which itself requires candor. Pixar uses a braintrust to embrace candor. Still, people are prone to block candor, and instead return to fear, intimidation, retaliation—the braintrust is intended to address that squarely and protect the compact of collaborative meetings.

Braintrust's working groups only requirement is a knack for storytelling and a demand for candor. At first, every idea, every film sucks, and it is the team's job to make a project not suck. A creative idea has to start somewhere and through bracing, candid feedback and iteration, a product finds it's meaning and form.

Why a braintrust? Because people get lost in complicated projects. How do you get leaders to address problems they cannot see? How do you see what a person sees only in their head? How do you address what will technically work and what won't? Finding such clarity takes patience and candor.

How does this process work? First, it's important to hear each other's idea

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vikramrojo / gist:c33d34d0f34186992b7d
Last active September 17, 2015 19:35
Bridging the Gap Between Actual and Reported Behavior in User Research

UX researchers often encounter a gap between the preferences people express and their behavior—inconsistencies that occur depending on context, frame of mind etc. Why does this gap exist?

  1. Social Desirability & Conformity-We're likely to respond with a societally correct answer, known as "social desirability bias." This bias can be minimized by asking questions in a neutral tone, framing them to be as open as possible where there are no clear socially "better" answers. The herd effect can also be reduced with one-on-one interviews.

  2. Wishful Thinking-We tend to overvalue our abilities and see what we'd like to be true vs what is true. We see ourselves optimisitcally whereas in reality, we overlook our shortcomings and are less self aware than we think. It's hard to combat this as users honestly believe in their optimism, try to focus on what users actually do vs what they would do.

  3. Differing Contexts & Mindsets-We respond differently in different contexts, both internal and external contexts. We resp

@vikramrojo
vikramrojo / index.js
Last active January 20, 2018 15:28
CSS in JS using styled-components, polished & styled-system
import React from 'react';
import styled, { ThemeProvider, css } from 'styled-components'
import { darken, lighten } from 'polished'
import { space, width, fontSize, color } from 'styled-system'
import { storiesOf } from '@storybook/react';
// import { action } from '@storybook/addon-actions';
// import { linkTo } from '@storybook/addon-links';
//Theme for Layers
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vikramrojo / UsabilityCriteria.md
Last active November 17, 2017 03:39
Usability criteria for web application heuristic evaluations

Usability Criteria

Derived from various usability literature, these usability inspection criteria are meant to be used in heuristic evaluations of web applications.

Requirements

Identifying a match between system and user

UC1_Requirements provision

The set of functions offered by the system best caters to the needs and requirements of user

User and System

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vikramrojo / UsableInterface.md
Last active September 19, 2019 09:24
An intuitive evaluation criteria

Usable Interface

Derived from various usability literature, these 8 usability inspection criteria are meant to be used in critiques and evaluations of web applications.

💰 Affordance

Degree to how seamlessly an app’s layout directs a user to their goals

Requirements Provision

  • The set of features offered by the system satisfies the needs and requirements of users