Welcome Back!
It’s been a pretty fun month full of learning and reading! I also got a twitter account so feel free to follow me @IshaanaMisra!
Presenting At The TKS Showcase! 🎤
This month I had the amazing opportunity to give a live presentation at The New York Knowledge Society’s annual showcase! The Knowledge Society(TKS) is a community of people who are working on solving big world problems and learning about exponential technologies. I gave a presentation on the TECH TRUCK, which was a project I worked on in March with the aim to provide women in developing countries with access to technology. I also filmed a video for the showcase discussing some AI projects and AI + healthcare. This showcase marked the end of the official TKS Innovate program which I was a part of. I grew so much during this period of time and wanted to give a shoutout to Hayley Caddess and Brandon Jennings, my directors at the program, who helped me and my peers learn so much during the last nine months!
₿itcoin Is Here To Stay, Whether You Like It Or Not
In June I did a deep dive of Bitcoin! Bitcoin and the crypto world has intrigued me since I started reading The Bitcoin Standard, so I decided to learn more about Bitcoin. I started off with a few recommended videos and articles explaining core concepts, and then went on to read the famous Bitcoin Whitepaper. I also wrote an article on some of the technical aspects of Bitcoin and some of its key characteristics. Next month I look forward to learning more about blockchain and start related programming!
“What many living in developed countries with stable governments don’t realize is how lucky they are to have a (relatively) stable currency. While inflation in the US might seem bad, it’s almost nothing when compared to inflation in developing countries like Nigeria, Sudan and Ethiopia. For people who previously had an untrustworthy currency to have a decentralized currency which no government can take away or control is liberating.”
Learning Javascript 👩🏽💻
In June I also took out some time to complete a JavaScript course online. JS is a really fun language one you get the hang of it(though I’m still biased towards Python :)! I look forward to using JS for web development, since that’s something I’ve wanted to do for a while now. I’ve been coding for almost a year now and I believe that everyone should learn how to code, since it really expands the way you think and I’ve seen myself become a lot more creative as a result.
Books I’m Reading 📚
The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
This month since school is now officially over, I got the chance to read more! One of my favorite books that I read this month was The War of Art. The book is about how to get better at doing creative things consistently. The book introduces the concept of Resistance as the enemy of creativity, and how Resistance is what is standing between us and our ideal selves. Pressfield also talked about how doing something, it could be anything, like writing or painting, as an amateur is different than doing it with the mindset of a professional. Professionals are more disciplined in their area and work out of love and pure passion, unlike amateurs who only work/practice whenever they feel like it. Check out this Twitter thread for more!
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
Last month, I read the Biography of Benjamin Franklin by Walter Isaacson in which numerous references were made to the founding father’s Autobiography unlike any other, so I thought I should check it out. This Autobiography gives the readers great insight into the values and maxims of Franklin, such as to be industrious and to get points across by way of Socratic Questioning instead of heated arguments. One of the best parts of the book is that it’s addressed to his son, and throughout the book it feels like he’s speaking directly with the reader, giving the younger generation advice.
Impressive work. Just a few remarks on your Bitcoin piece:
The bitcoin network was designed to have 21 million BTC in the end, but it is very well possible to change that, and many people are convinced that's what the community will eventually do.
Money is not the same as currency. Most money takes the form of debt nowadays. Replacing the dollar with BTC would not solve the (ever-rising) debt problem in any way. Additional measures would be necessary, but then again those would work just as well without BTC.
I do agree that BTC is here to stay, as long as people think the "number go up" :)