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Joined 9 months ago
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Cake day: September 26th, 2024

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  • Oh, that is definitely true in the U.S.

    Also, I’ve found that rail travel is inconvenient in the U.S. I can’t confirm, but it seems like the Amtrak only comes through my (Midwest) area once a week, on Wednesdays or something like that. So, if I plan a trip, I need to plan around.

    Midwest to the East Coast is so much cheaper and faster by air. I want to travel by rail - and you’d think it should be cheaper - but it’s totally not.

    Part of it, I believe, is that Amtrak leases the usage of the rail lines from the shipping companies, so it must adhere to their schedules of shipping freight. The USA spends so much on upgrading its highway system; if they used a fraction of that money towards rail travel we would be set. But certain companies keep lobbying Congress to keep us locked in a model where we are totally reliant on cars and gasoline.




  • The human brain processes information by chunking - bundling up information into chunks to remember it. It’s like a .zip file or compression on an image. That process is a bit lossy. If you’ve ever tried to write a technical document or a rules-set for a game, and had a user go through the document undirected, you’ll see it in action.

    The more complicated, technical, or tedious the instructions are, the more likely loss or misinterpretation will occur. A friend of mine says that writing a technical document is like programming a computer that skips every 7th line.

    As a person who has written many of these, I’ve found ways to counteract / ameliorate their problems:

    • the use of paragraphing important points that you want feedback on
    • When sending to multiple people, but wanting feedback from a specific person, I bold, underline, and color their name next to their action item, so they know it’s for them
    • Using checklists or bullet points
    • explaining things through multiple avenues, like with visual images and with text simultaneously

    I hope this helps!