Author: knjohn

California Farms Are Using Drilling Wastewater to Grow Crops | Bloomberg Business

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

California’s epic drought is pushing Big Oil to solve a problem it’s struggled with for decades: what to do with the billions of gallons of wastewater that gush out of wells every year.

Golden State drillers have pumped much of that liquid back underground into disposal wells. Now, amid a four-year dry spell, more companies are looking to recycle their water or sell it to parched farms as the industry tries to get ahead of environmental lawsuits and new regulations.

The trend could have implications for oil patches across the country. With fracking boosting the industry’s thirst for water, companies have run into conflicts from Texas to Colorado to Pennsylvania. California could be an incubator for conservation efforts that have so far failed to gain traction elsewhere in the U.S.

Read More.

PayPal Will Change User Agreement After Robocall Concerns | Small Biz Trends

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

PayPal recently came under fire for possibly violating the FCC’s robocall policies.

The new User Agreement, which was set to go live on July 1, indicated that the company intends to robocall and text users on any number they have from them, possibly even ones that are not associated with their account.

The purposes of these texts and calls are varied and could include marketing.

Consumer advocacy groups pointed out that the new agreement seemed to say that users must agree to let the company send automated surveys, offers and promotions, without the ability to opt-out. There was not clear wording on whether or not the users who disagreed would have to stop using the company’s services.

Read More.

China stocks hammered as market crash continues | CNN Money

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

China stocks plunged again on Wednesday, even as regulators worked to contain a crisis that has wiped trillions of dollars off the country’s stock markets.

The Shanghai Composite plunged 8% at the market open on Wednesday, and spent the entire day in negative territory before closing down 5.9%. The vast majority of stocks listed on the benchmark index shed 10%, the maximum limit shares are allowed to fall before being halted.

The smaller Shenzhen Composite lost 2.5%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 5.8%.

“At the moment there is a mood of panic in the market and a large increase in irrational dumping of shares, causing a strain of liquidity in the stock market,” China Securities Regulatory Commission said in statement.

Since June 12, the Shanghai Composite has lost an unnerving 32%. The Shenzhen market, which has more tech companies and is often compared to America’s Nasdaq index, is down 41% over the same period.

Read More.

Genetically Modified Animals Will Be on Your Plate in No Time | WIRED

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

NO ONE EATS genetically modified animals. That is to say, human beings have modified almost every domesticated foodstuff, plant, and animal through traditional breeding techniques. But start using genetic engineering technology, moving genes around or inserting one from one living thing into another, and people freak right the hell out. That’s what happened two weeks ago—France went into a panic because a lamb that was the offspring of a sheep modified to express a green fluorescent protein made it to market. In Europe, genetically modified organisms are outright banned; in the US, lots of staple crops like corn have plenty of modified genes. But animals? That’s a line supermarkets haven’t crossed.

Read More.

How to Grab and Keep Your Audience in the Attention Economy | BusinessTips.com

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

downloadFrom closing the deal to firing up your team, make your message stick with SHARPs

Want to know your real competition when you’re speaking, whether to an individual or group? You’re up against the human mind. Weighing in at just three pounds, this competitor is the repository of countless conscious and unconscious thoughts.

We are all bombarded with data at every turn. Our smartphones (and the constant content they provide) call to us like sirens, ready to distract us under the guise of multi-tasking.

This is the attention economy. And it’s the new reality.

The average attention span for an adult is a measly 8 seconds (we’re only 2 seconds better than our kids). This doesn’t mean that you can only hold someone’s attention for 8 seconds; it means that you can lose it in 8 seconds.1

With this reality, we face an even greater challenge every time we communicate an idea, a request or an action item. How do we connect? How do we get through all that other clutter caused by the attention economy? How can we be more compelling than the smartphone?

Read More.

Dubai to print world’s first 3D-printed office building (it’ll just take a few weeks) | Inhaitat

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

The United Arab Emirates likes to be first when it comes to amazing feats of construction and technology, and architecture in Dubai is constantly pushing the envelope. The world’s tallest building already towers over Dubai’s skyline, and now the city is planning to build the world’s first fully 3D-printed office building. It’s a cool, space-age structure that will save a bundle on construction costs and material waste.

The office building will take just a matter of weeks to construct. The overall structure won’t be that big in terms of scale, covering just 2,000 square feet (186 square meters), but it’ll be huge for the 3D-printing history. The building will be the world’s first fully-functional 3D-printed office building, and will serve as operations headquarters for the recently opened Museum of the Future, which is located nearby the building site and also features 3D-printed components. The office building will be printed one layer at a time by a 20-foot-tall 3D printer, and then assembled onsite. What’s more, all of the furniture, fixtures, detailing, and structural components will also be 3D-printed, making this endeavor the most ambitious 3D-printing project in architectural history.

Read More.

Employee Engagement? What If Employees Don’t Want To Be Engaged? | Forbes

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

downloadEngagement statistics really haven’t changed much over the past 10 years. Why? Surely, we’ve focused enough attention, money, staff, time and energy on the concept of engagement to make a huge difference. And yet the numbers remain relatively flat and generally negative.

But what if people just don’t want to be engaged?

By and large, leaders know that they can’t make their people suddenly become passionate about the company’s mission and strategy, the customer experience, the bottom line, or any other owner-level consideration. Thoughtful leaders understand that employees must first want to make a larger contribution, so these leaders institute recognition and reward programs designed to foster a desire to engage…and still, in many cases, no appreciable or sustainable engagement materializes. Why?

It might be time to build a process of engagement that includes more than just an organizational motivation approach. In the book Influencer, authors Patterson, Grenny, Switzler, Maxfield and McMillan reveal two other, equally important sources of motivation that can be brought to bear on any change goal, including this stubborn challenge of employee engagement—namely, social motivation (peer influence) and individual motivation (intrinsic desire). When combined with organizational rewards, these two sources of influence can create a formidable recipe for sustained increases in engagement. Let’s explore both.

Read More.

These 3 Tricks Can Actually Help You Get Smarter | Page19

~ knjohn ~ Leave a comment

On-intelligenceWhat if all you had to do to become smarter was play a quirky little game, like Angry Birds? Or pick up an instrument? It may be no more complicated than that! Here are three scientifically proven ways you can up your intelligence.

What would you do with a few extra IQ points?  What new plans would you be able to put into action? What creative solutions could you come up with? We’d all love to be just a bit brainier, wouldn’t we? And that’s precisely what Dan Hurley’s new book, Smarter, is all about. In his exploration of fluid intelligence, he’s come upon three tried-and-true ways that anyone can start improving his brain.

Read More.