Monthly Insights #007
July's covers the latest on GPT-3, new python certifications and virtual events not to miss out on!
Hi 👋,
Can you believe we're more than half-way through the year?! At the start of the year when I started this newsletter, I wanted to regularly share the articles and resources I come across that I think others would find interesting. What have you enjoyed in the newsletter so far? Let me know here!
July seems to have disappeared! We've been doing a little home rearranging this month to make it feel cosier and to better separate our working and relaxation areas. After 4+ months, it's been a welcomed change moving things around, it almost feels like a new space.
I've also been trying to do some digital decluttering and find a solution for managing my newsletter subscriptions! Recently, I've subscribed to more and more and my initial plan of filtering them into their own folder has let them pile up and not get round to reading them! I've now gone through the 100+ unread newsletters, read, digested and redirected them all to Stoop - which is great so far! Any other newsletter readers I should check out?
📰 Highlighted Posts
Atomic Habits: Build Better Habits in 4 minutes: Are you wanting to start a new habit or kick an old one? Check out the key points from Atomic Habits by James Clear based on the 4 laws of behaviour change: Make it Obvious, Make it Attractive, Make it Easy, Make it Satisfying.
You can also find a selection of my articles on Medium.
🔍Top resources
This month’s recommended resources from across the web and beyond!
Confirmation Bias: As shared in Monthly Insights #001, I’m still loving the MakerMind newsletter and this article summarises confirmation bias with examples of thought experiments and ways to “uncloud your judgement”. Working with data, we all have expectations of what we think our data should look like and it’s important to avoid confirmation bias and let data tell the story!
Python Certifications: FreeCodeCamp have just announced new certifications in python including Scientific Computing, Data Analysis, and Machine Learning. I enjoyed the previous FreeCodeCamp certifications in web development with work through examples and projects. The format of this course is a little different, focusing on short videos and multiple-choice questions - if you're new to python, give it a go!
GPT-3 comes with a warning ⚠️ : You may have seen the hype around the latest beta release of GPT-3 - OpenAI's 3rd generation neural-network-powered language model. Taking a first look, I was impressed by this implementation of GPT-3 in Google Sheets! However, keeping in mind this paper studying the systematic biases in natural language generation with GPT-2, and noting the CONTENT WARNING on the GPT-3 GitHub page, I await the improvements in the full release, including the potential filters that may be introduced.
🚀Projects & Events
What I’ve been up to in this month…
This month I joined a few events run by TheBridge which I found through Diversify Tech newsletter. The Algorithmic Bias event is now available to watch on their website!
Introducing video tutorials... I'm currently planning to try and create video tutorials based on my previous articles. I've borrowed a mic after my internal laptop mic was too noisy and I've installed some video editing software. It's a big learning curve so far..! Watch this space for my first video on Getting Started with Pandas!
📚This month’s reading list
I loved getting lost in Recursion this month as I forced myself to finish Crucial Conversations - key points coming soon as a blog post.
#014: Recursion by Blake Crouch ✭✭✭✭✩
#015: Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High by Al Switzler, Joseph Grenny, and Ron McMillan ✭✭✩✩✩
📘 Currently reading (listening to the audiobook): Queenie by Candice Carty-Williams
Thanks for reading this month's insights! If you enjoyed this issue, let me know!
Take care and see you next month!
Kerry