Guy Kawasaki says, "the hardest part about getting started is getting started", and it's especially true for procrastinators like us. We all want to read articles, posts, and books about the things we're interested in; but something or the other gets in the way, and sometimes, we are just too lazy. Here, we say goodbye to all that!
The main motivation behind creating this group is to drive our lazy asses to do something productive in our spare time. We believe that a schedule and deadline will force us to participate more actively in reading and discussion. Each person in the group will give a talk in a round-robin fashion on a topic of their interest. We plan to have a session every Monday.
May 22, 2017: Fun with Calendars: Part II (by Chetan)
Reference(s)
Same as Part I below.
Summary
This session was the continuation of the previous session and covered the remaining topics i.e. Seasons, Year, Precession - of the earth and the Moon, and Epochs.
May 15, 2017: Fun with Calendars: Part I (by Chetan)
Reference(s)
Most of the talk was based on an old Marathi book, Aakashashi Jadavu Naate by S. S. Gokhale. Other sources: wikipedia and internet. Original sources: Siddhant Shiromani by Bhaskara II and Suryasiddhanta. English translations of both are available freely on google books.
Summary
This session introduced us with the basics of calendar systems with the focus on traditional hindu calendar system. The talk was broken down into following major parts - Geocentric system, Rasis, Nakshatras and Charans (building blocks and vocabulary), Day, Days of a Week, Month (Maas), Seasons, Year and Precession. This session covered topics until the concept of Month.
May 3, 2017: Basic Economics: Elasticity and Policy Making (by Udbhav)
Udbhav talked about elasticity of the demand and supply curves and how they can be used to get quantitative metrics about the market. We also see how elasticity can explain a lot of market trends and forces. Finally we do a review of how taxes affect the total output from a market and analyse how suppliers and consumers bear their burden.
Apr 26, 2017: Basic Economics: Supply and Demand (by Udbhav)
Udbhav talked about the demand and supply curves and how they develop from the individual supply and demands of millions of actors interacting in the market. We also see what factors affect these curves.
Hiking the Grand Canyon, and rim to rim at that, is a feather that most avid hikers seek to add to their cap. This presentation takes you through everything you need to know to successfully hike the Grand Canyon, from terrain to gear to training, with the added bonus of an awe-inspiring motivational message by one of the greatest thought leaders alive.
Apr 17, 2017: So Good They Can't Ignore You (by Prabhav)
This book debunks the popular belief that "follow your passion" is good career advice. Cal then lists a set of rules/templates which people should follow for having a happy and successful career. He also provides examples how people's career fit into the templates given by him.
Apr 10, 2017: The Design of Everyday Things (by Pavan)
"Why are some everyday things so hard to use?". To help answer this question, Don Norman describes a set of principles and terms that define good or bad designs. This includes Affordances, Signifiers, Conceptual Model, System Image, Discoverability, Feedback, Mapping and "7 stages of action" or steps on how people do things. We conclude with a discusson on how to put this into real world with an exercise.
Apr 3, 2017: The San Francisco Housing Crisis (by Kashyap)
I'll review what the crisis looks like in numbers, some of the global housing trends such as "The Great Inversion", and the development of the "Slow Growth" movement in SF and California, beginning with the 1950s. We'll look at how rent control came to be, how neighborhood groups and developers have worked with policies and regulations, and where tech fits into all of this.
Udbhav reviewed production posssibilites again and the concave shape of the curve. He also talked about how trade can provide benefit to both the parties involved in trade and gave examples of it.
The talk is primarily structured around first two chapters of the book. Chapter 1 provides a brief introduction to economics and then talks about the principles of economics: principles for individuals, principles for interactions, and principles for the whole economy. Chapter 2 provides some of the economic models such as the circular flow diagram and the production possibilities frontier.
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