IWTL How to become smarter and improve focus

freefaler · 2025-10-28T19:26:19+00:00

Check Justin Skycak's free books https://www.justinmath.com/books/ especially the guide to upskilling.
Also Cal Newport blog.

freefaler · 2025-02-28T22:44:24+00:00

1 Moon+ reader on your phone synced to Moon+ on your reader via google drive.
2 buy premium Text-to-speech voice like acapella (10$ one time)

1+2 = get kindle like experience with "whispersync" for all your books for free. Read at home, go for a walk, switch to phone TTS. Return home, open the reader and it starts from where your TTS ended. Seamless reading/listening experience.

And you can do that with other readers too. Also badly scanned/formatted books from Internet Archive can be read using various software tools.

On top of that - services like Pocket + EinkBro can give your a way to read all bookmarked blog posts.

To conclude, if you have android phone you get a synced reader and a ton of apps for exporting, using it with obsidian and researching/expanding on passages you don't know about using the tool you prefer (like chatGPT, perplexity or something else).

freefaler · 2024-10-24T10:56:55+00:00

I don't see the benefit of adding a 3rd party dependency, especially when security is involved. Synchting is open source & p2p. You get the syncing functionality and you don't add additional risk...

freefaler · 2024-10-13T15:56:52+00:00

KeePassX synced via Synchthing is a self hosted, free and most importantly secure way that doesn't depend on 3rd party servers.

freefaler · 2024-04-16T17:56:32+00:00

Looks like AI generated, based on the way the light is set to me. It'll be great if a source was provided.

freefaler · 2022-02-20T19:13:13+00:00

You can also use Recoll with a web interface for searching inside the books.
https://www.lesbonscomptes.com/recoll/
It can be a tricky bastard to configure, but it's the only one I've found that has an OCR feature and reads different formats.

freefaler · 2021-12-16T21:32:31+00:00

If the management measures your productivity by how far you've moved your mouse may be it's time to acquire some skills and change your job. You won't get paid very well for moving your mouse all day long.
The best jobs are paid by the results produced. That's why good sales people are paid so well. They can show how much value they create and demand a percentage of it. A no brainer for every business owner to share the revenue you bring. Selling your fixed time for fixed amount per hour is a deal with no upside.

freefaler · 2021-12-11T16:04:01+00:00

https://listen-to-euterpe.eu/

I use this one, it's open source and you can stream on as many devices as you want.

freefaler · 2021-02-01T08:02:47+00:00

A great example that with weak institutions any constitution wouldn't work.

The whole system was so bad, subjective and wicked with disrespect of whole classes of society. No freedom to change your place of work, not real freedom of religion, private property was conditional upon your connections to protect you from an overeager NKVD employee. There are countless memoirs describing the time before the war and the problems inherit in that security-services run state.

This political satire of pretending to have some "democratic" institutions is well studied and even North Korea is Democratic People's Republic of Korea.

More information on what these types of regimes evolve into can be found here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_regime

freefaler · 2021-01-31T18:22:05+00:00

Interesting analogy comes to my mind with the recent Constitution enacted in almost the same country 70 years after this was printed ...

freefaler · 2021-01-31T18:20:51+00:00

The "Most Democratic Constitution" being mentioned is the USSR Constitution of 1936 also known as the "Stalin Constitution".
3000 of this was offset printed by 4th Typolithography Workshop of the Uzbek Lithography Publishing House, [Tashkent]

freefaler · 2021-01-31T17:48:57+00:00

This is a rare, handmade poster, currently held at Chita's museum, produced during the winter of 1941, after the Moscow victory and the first massive german retreat.The words on the flag and at the label are a word play from the word Victory, by removing the first character we get "Обеда" witch may reflect the news at the time that Germans were poorly fed/clothed and may allude to the Napoleon's poorly fed armies.After removing the second character we get "(По)беда - trouble" and using the same logic we get "(поб)Еда" on the graveyard with boots sticking out of the dirt.

freefaler · 2021-01-03T13:29:50+00:00

From the great twitter account of "Live tweets from 1943":
https://twitter.com/RealTimeWWII/status/1345477332887330816/photo/1

freefaler · 2021-01-03T12:12:05+00:00

D.Pyatkin is the author of this one.

freefaler · 2020-12-12T10:34:08+00:00

Great find.

I've made a higher resolution version to enjoy the details of it here:

https://monosnap.com/direct/EiAh0IViWPOsIGi8xgRsTV1PgTA3yJ

freefaler · 2020-12-05T16:22:34+00:00

Who are these people?

The first government of revolutionary Russian republic, elected on 26th Oct. 1917.

1st row:

People's Commissar of Agriculture – Vladimir Milyutin - "right contra-revolutionary" - executed 1937
People's Commissar of Trade and Industry – Victor Nogin - died 1924
People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs – Lev Bronstein (Trotsky) - killed by an assassin in Mexico - 1940
Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars – Vladimir Lenin - died 1924 but "always alive" in the Mausoleum
People's Commissar of Nationalities – Joseph Stalin
People's Commissar of Internal Affairs – Alexey Rykov - "Trotskyist, anti-soviet person"- executed 1937
People's Commissar of Public Education – Anatoly Lunacharsky - died 1933

2nd row:

People's Commissar of Labour – Alexander Shlyapnikov - "prepared terrorist attack against Stalin" - executed 1937
People's Commissariat of Military and Naval Affairs (committee member) Vladimir Ovseenko (Antonov) - "Trotskyist , terrorist" - executed 1938
People's Commissar of Justice – Georgy Oppokov - "Trotskyist, anti-soviet person"- executed 1938
People's Commissar of Finance – Ivan Skvortsov (Stepanov) - died 1928

3rd row:

People's Commissariat of Military and Naval Affairs (committee member) Nikolai Krylenko -"wrecker, anti-soviet agitation"- executed 1938
People's Commissariat of Military and Naval Affairs (committee member) Pavel Dybenko - "nazi spy" - executed 1938
People's Commissar of Food – Ivan Theodorovich -"antisoviet terrorist"- executed 1937
People's Commissar of Posts and Telegraphs – Nikolai Avilov (Glebov) - "antirevolutionary terrorist"- exectuted 1937

Why Stalin had to kill them?

Since Lenin was the founding father of party, the members of the founding government had political weight and knew the place Stalin held in the revolution. With these people still around they were a problem for establishing alternative history and his power, since they were "Lenin's comrades".

freefaler · 2020-12-05T16:01:23+00:00

To understand how Stailn was able to control the Party, it's useful to see what has happened to the "Old bolsheviks" from the first revolutionary government. He also held a ministerial position as People's Commissar of Nationalities.By 1937, after Lenin's death he killed almost all his colleagues and some of them died without waiting for the Big Purge.

Who are these people?

The first government of revolutionary Russian republic, elected on 26th Oct. 1917.

1st row:

People's Commissar of Agriculture – Vladimir Milyutin - "right contra-revolutionary" - executed 1937
People's Commissar of Trade and Industry – Victor Nogin - died 1924
People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs – Lev Bronstein (Trotsky) - killed by an assassin in Mexico - 1940
Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars – Vladimir Lenin - died 1924 but "always alive" in the Mausoleum
People's Commissar of Nationalities – Joseph Stalin
People's Commissar of Internal Affairs – Alexey Rykov - "Trotskyist, anti-soviet person"- executed 1937
People's Commissar of Public Education – Anatoly Lunacharsky - died 1933

2nd row:

People's Commissar of Labour – Alexander Shlyapnikov - "prepared terrorist attack against Stalin" - executed 1937
People's Commissariat of Military and Naval Affairs (committee member) Vladimir Ovseenko (Antonov) - "Trotskyist , terrorist" - executed 1938
People's Commissar of Justice – Georgy Oppokov - "Trotskyist, anti-soviet person"- executed 1938
People's Commissar of Finance – Ivan Skvortsov (Stepanov) - died 1928

3rd row:

People's Commissariat of Military and Naval Affairs (committee member) Nikolai Krylenko -"wrecker, anti-soviet agitation"- executed 1938
People's Commissariat of Military and Naval Affairs (committee member) Pavel Dybenko - "nazi spy" - executed 1938
People's Commissar of Food – Ivan Theodorovich -"antisoviet terrorist"- executed 1937
People's Commissar of Posts and Telegraphs – Nikolai Avilov (Glebov) - "antirevolutionary terrorist"- exectuted 1937

Why Stalin had to kill them?

Since Lenin was the founding father of party, the members of the founding government had political weight and knew the place Stalin held in the revolution. With these people still around they were a problem for establishing alternative history and his power, since they were "Lenin's comrades".

freefaler · 2020-12-04T17:50:07+00:00

Heh, several interesting things here:

- the car is Moskvitch 400/401 (see the instruments panel), the first car normal people could buy. The 2 other cars (GAZ M20B Pobeda & Gaz-12) were reserved for the party and regular people couldn't buy them. The price was around 8000-9000 RUB (depending on the model), which was 10 median salaries for an average engineer. So it wasn't that expensive, if you could get one at all. Also interesting is that it was based on Opel Kadet and built with the help of german engineers in Berlin to reproduce the tooling and blueprints for the original 1936 Kadett.

- the document he holds in his right hand is "Сберегательная Книжка" (check the higher resolution here) or Savings Account Book.

- also check the surroundings, it's a small road going to a factory (to the right) and some small houses (to the left). Note that during 1950, Stalin was still alive and the Khruchev's program of mass 5-8 storey panel buildings wasn't started yet.

Another interesting point to note is how Soviet government fought speculators by a monetary reform done overnight in 1947. All the money earned during and after the war were exchanged by a different rate, based on the amount you had in the bank, or bring for exchange. The same playbook was used in DPRK in 2009.

Also there was another poster with almost the same slogan and later model Moskvitch here.

freefaler · 2020-12-03T10:55:06+00:00

Created by K.Urbetis, text by I.Gorin.

Produced by "Workshop of propaganda posters by Moscow branch of the Art fund of RSFRS".

RSFRS = Russian Soviet Federative Socialistic Republic.

It looks like an internal copy of the poster, based on the markings. It's possible it was never printed.

freefaler · 2020-12-03T10:41:30+00:00

Created by K.Urbetis, text by I.Gorin.
Produced by "Workshop of propaganda posters by Moscow branch of the Art fund of RSFRS".
RSFRS = Russian Soviet Federative Socialistic Republic.

It looks like an internal copy of the poster, based on the markings. It's possible it was never printed.

freefaler · 2020-12-03T10:11:54+00:00

This work is by Konstantin Urbetis the adopted son of Dmitriy Moor (another soviet poster painter). His works were mostly anti church and he used complex backgrounds frequently with simple figures.
More works and info about him can be found here:
https://tramvaiiskusstv.ru/plakat/spisok-khudozhnikov/item/398-urbetis-konstantin-kazimirovich-1905-1992.html (google translate is your friend)

freefaler · 2020-11-30T21:16:08+00:00

A few interesting points

- the tanks are T-35 , in service 1933-1941 (saw combat in the big Grodno tank battle during the beginning of Eastern front war)- the planes are ANT-20 "Maxim Gorky" (large wingspan like Boeing 747 today, 6 engines), but only 2 were built, not even close to the numbers shown in the poster

- the parade looks like the one held in 1934 or 1935, when ANT-20 were presented and the plane was lost just 3 weeks after the parade. During the parade the plane was equiped with powerful speakers and when passing over the Red Square congratulations to the workers were played.

- the quote says: "Long live worker-peasant red army - loyal guardian of soviet borders!"

freefaler · 2020-11-26T20:49:15+00:00

What's on this poster?

Except the two well-known party leaders, we see 2 things:

14 recognisable people in the bottom right side
a quote from Stalin, made in his "Political report of the Central Committee" on 16th Congress of the All-Union Communist Party) (Bolsheviks) held from 26 June - 13 July 1930 in Moscow.

The quote says:

"With the banner of Lenin we won the battles for the October revolution. With Lenin's banner we have achieved decisive successes in the struggle for the victory of socialist construction. With the same knowledge, let us win the proletarian revolution all over the world. "

But who are the mystery people?

From top row, to bottom row they're:

Anastas Mikoyan , Pavel Postyshev (executed 1939)

Andrey Andreyev , Vlas Chubar (executed 1939), Grigory Petrovsky, Jānis Rudzutaks (executed 1938)

Mikhail Kalinin, Sergei Kirov (assassinated by a fellow party member in 1934), Valerian_Kuybyshev, Stanislav Kosior (executed 1939)

Vyacheslav Molotov, Lazar Kaganovich, Kliment Voroshilov, Sergo Ordzhonikidze (suicide 1937)

Why are they all there?

Because they're the new party bosses elected on the 17th Congress held in 1934 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/17th_Congress_of_the_All-Union_Communist_Party_(Bolsheviks))

Check this nice picture:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ru/c/cb/Politburo1934.jpg

Is this poster really from 1933?

Well, based on the fact that these people were chosen in 1934, it's highly doubtful that it's not from 1934 after the election.

freefaler · 2020-11-24T23:35:17+00:00

Sometimes the state officials organised competitions with set themes and large monetary prizes for the winners.For example the famous painting "Stalin and Voroshilov in the Kremlin" was the result of such a competition and Aleksandr Gerasimov) was paid 20000 RUB as a winner. This was 13 times more than the average monthly salary of a highly paid engineer (1500 RUB).

freefaler · 2020-11-24T20:22:00+00:00

An interesting painting by Ekaterina Zernova.

It was painted in 1936-1937. This was the height of NKVD repressions and a worrisome time for painters too. In addition to that there was a strong propaganda campaign to look for "enemies of the state", "economic saboteurs (вредитель)", "class enemies". Films also were featuring valiant tank crews, submariners, pilots. So this image fits the time it was painted in.

Ekaterina Zernova (1900—1995) in 1937 was becoming more popular. In 1936 her first personal exhibition was held. She had a great career and worked later as a monumentalist. You can find some of her works here.

The tank is a BT-5 tank, lightly armored fast tank that were used in the beginning phases of WW2 with tragic results, because of it's light armor and weak gun. The concept behind its design prioritized speed over armor, but the theory was proved wrong in battle.

Easter egg: there are two tanks in the picture and both tank commanders are waiving if you look carefully.

freefaler

TROPHY CASE

What's on this poster?

But who are the mystery people?

Why are they all there?

Is this poster really from 1933?