Archive for the ‘High School’ Category
Spartans going viral
Hello all readers, sorry for the absence of posts lately. As high school students we are still terribly busy with AP exams and other studies but we have a whole chock full of things to get to as soon as tests are over including a fresh site redesign, a new blog, and a couple of other ideas that I have been keeping in mind.
One of the latest ideas that has gone pretty well was this Facebook group to get the whole country to write “THIS IS SPARTA” on AP and other essays and then cross it out with a single line.
Credit goes to my friend Jake Bryant for coming up with this idea 4 months ago for our English midterm. It went pretty well then so I made a note of it to recreate this idea for Facebook and make it go viral.
In just a week, this group has grown to over 4,000 members! Sure this is really nothing compared to the infamous 1,000,000 Strong for Colbert group but I’ve been lucky to get even 100 members in any group I made so this is huge.
Plus it’s a good thing. The letters AP (Advanced Placement) strike fear into the hearts of many high school students but this really alleviates the stress to borderline mock the test.
That and I really wanna see a teacher’s face when they see that thousands of students all wrote “THIS IS SPARTA” on their AP exams. Can you say WTF?
UPDATE: Group now has over 8000 members! It literally doubled in one day and shows no sign of stopping
UPDATE: SPARTANS ARE AT 20,000 MEMBERS!!!
~Kevin Xu
5 Tips for Campaigning
I have been at the State Leadership Conference for FBLA these last three days and one of my major “things to do” was campaigning for District Vice President! I was successful albeit I was the only one running but I learned many things that I thought I’d share.
- Don’t waste your time- This is a major one because at a 3-day event, time is of the essence. After I set up my booth at the campaigning room, I would stand by it when no one else was around. I thought this was the thing we were “supposed” to be doing or maybe someone in charge would come around and wonder where I was but both were wrong. I wasted time trying to do the right thing when I could have competed in more events and network with more people and then come to my booth during busy hours. Instead time passed under my boredom.
- Act fast, Act first- Whether it’s when you’re campaigning, talking to someone, or eyeing that cute girl you want to dance with across the room, you got to act fast and act first. There is no right time for anything but there are wrong times and that’s when you are too late. Either the opportunity will be gone or taken away and you will never know what could have came out of it if you had just toughened up to go and do it. In most cases just think about it this way, you’re going to be doing it anyways so might as well do it early and get it over with.
- Find minions- In other words, delegate your tasks. Every great boss knows this and does this well. Every unsuccessful boss has this mentality that “nobody else can do things as well as I” which leads to overworking and bombing. Learn to rely on your friends to do things when you can’t or to make your work faster. I had many friends represent me at my booth while I did other tasks which helped a lot.
- Network, network, network- You have probably heard this at every other blog you’ve read but it is still true. You meet amazing people at events or conferences and some of those people can come in very handy or lifelong friends. More connections open yourself to more opportunities so definitely take the initiative and talk to people. I’ve realized that people really don’t mind because they are looking forward to meeting new people too so taking the initiative only makes things quicker.
- Learn names- You get an awesome sense of a personal bond when you actually greet someone with their name. You come to learn someone’s name when they see it or from a peek at their nametag but learn to immediately memorize it if you feel this is a friend you will come back to. As Vice President, names are a must for me especially of board of trustee members and other important adults.
Are you keeping things too private?
In today’s growing “social” world where websites like Facebook, Flickr, Last.fm, Twitter, Wikipedia, and now Friendfeed all encourage this thing called “sharing”, should we be more focused on keeping things private or encourage sharing and the collaboration of minds?
One could argue that for startups, there is the need for privacy and to not let their “sacred ideas” get out before they get a chance to make something of it. So-called as going into stealth mode, founders try to keep as much as possible on the downlow until launch and boom from there. But this would also mean not getting other people’s view on things and being very selfish over things.
Recently I took my SAT and did pretty well (2330) so came the onslaught of “Ooh whatdya get’s?” from my friends. But no matter what I got I would have told them without embarrassment. Some of my friends on the other hand, refuse to reveal their elusive score in fear of criticism or who knows what. If they did bad, I would understand not telling the score and I instantly know it from the expression on their face so its ok.
But some cases, geniuses usually, choose not to say anything after “Ooh whatdya get?” probably in fear of competition. I know how their mind works, if they reveal what they got then I would know and if its better then I would take the test again and try to do better. Or if its worse then I can wallow inside on the sense that I did better. Or maybe they just don’t want to reveal how smart they are even though everyone probably knows they got a perfect score. Wrong, wrong and wrong, keeping it to themselves is just being selfish and conceited cause they don’t want others to do better themselves. In my case, I would never express any of the aforementioned reactions cause I honestly do want all my friends to do better and go to great colleges with me.
So I say embrace the idea of sharing and collaborating, the web sure has. Using tools like wiki’s makes things easier than ever. Of course you won’t want to reveal that super master plan for success to others but the basic ideas and concept should be out on the open market. A great example is Jessica Mah using a wiki last week to collaborate ideas for a speech she was presenting. She got the opinions of many others that crafted an even better speech.
I’m willing to bet the future will hold a lot more of this idea of sharing.
~Kevin Xu
Photo courtesy of photoai
GoCrossCampus― Bringing Risk Online
Remember the traditional board game you used to play with your friends on bored weekends? Well a couple of guys from Yale and a guy from Columbia want to bring that same intense territory-conquering battle to the web, to your campus, dorm vs dorm. Meet GoCrossCampus (GXC).
This has created a huge stir across campuses as dorms get to make secret alliances and betrayals to battle for supremacy! All in the sake for bragging rights, exactly what college students love.
The game has recently hit the NYT and Techcrunch providing substantial coverage for an otherwise unheard of game beyond the college campus. They hope to expand their user base to even more universities and even large corporations for office vs office type battles. According to the NYT, it seems that Google has taken quite an interest. I hope they find their way to my high school next!
In my opinion, they have done all the right steps so far growing what was an idea into a full-fledged startup. Not many ideas have become more than an idea in a college dorm room (not everyone can be a Facebook) but GXC shows a lot of promise.
The one thing I always wished to see more of with Web 2.0 was integration with the real world. I always viewed the internet as the next “New World”, kinda how America used to be viewed with limitless possibilities, but we still need direct interaction in our current world. GXC involves optional planned meetups to elect commanders and spies for even more fun which is exactly what I wanted to happen. I bet this can be expanded for even greater depth!
GXC even emailed me and we chatted about ideas and such. Who knows, this might possibly turn into something. I’ll keep you guys updated.
So everyone go sign up! You don’t have to be affiliated with any colleges to play some games like the GoCrossPoliticalBash. Go Colbert! =D
~Kevin Xu
Why be extra-super-duper-ordinary?
Hi, my name is Kevin Xu, and I am solipsistic.
Solipsism is apparently the philosophical idea that “My mind is the only thing that I know exists.” When you think about it, it’s true. Only I know what I feel when I touch something. Only I know what I think and everyone else’s thoughts are synthetic. I don’t know if anyone even exists when I’m not with them. Maybe all life was just created to further my life? Yes I’m saying that none of you are real and are only here to entertain me.
Of course, all of the above is sarcastic. But solipsism can be a major ego-booster if you’re ever feeling down, try it out.
A noob in San Francisco…
I failed to get into the SSBB tourney… (stupid line)
I failed to meet Aaron Stanton… (or any other tech dude)
I failed to go to meetups or conventions… (GDC costed $$$)
I failed to make any progress startup-worthy… But hey I got to visit San Francisco!!!
Wanna Doodle 4 Google?
Seems like Google wants to tap into the precious minds of pre-college kids once again― more specifically my age group.
Doodle 4 Google is Google’s newest project allowing kids in grades K-12 to draw a new Google logo and win prizes. It will be centered around the theme “What If…?” which leaves it open to an infinite amount of innovation. Grand prize includes a $10,000 college scholarship, a technology grant for your school, a trip to the Googleplex, and of course your logo on the Google homepage for a whole day.
Pretty genius idea if you ask me. The Google logo has become almost a cultural icon and if you are an artist this is an awesome opportunity to show off your ability. My bet is that Google is going to value the creativity of the logo way higher than the actual artistic prowess of it.
But I find it funny how GHOP just ended with the winners announced and now Doodle 4 Google starts. Google has done a fine job of micro-managing by splitting the company into different departments (Open Source, AdSense, Gmail, etc.) but it’s interesting how they all come together targeting 18 year olds and younger to join them as a part of these contests. It’s a great opportunity and also great prizes await. But it’s all just very interesting…
It’s not like Google is trying to brainwash kids at younger ages to hail them as Godly or something. The least we want is a new generation of fanboys/fangirls (being politically correct here). Or maybe they are just prepping kids to love them so they don’t have to pay them so much?
But I do admit that I love their logos:
~Kevin Xu
Hiatus
You know, I’m really getting the hang of making these ‘overused web 2.0-ish-y’ logos. Yeah they are really common-place and probably getting on some people’s nerves but there’s no denying that it is here to stay.
Sorry for the lack of posting again but we are re going on a hiatus for Midterm week and the SATs. Yeah, the trials and tribulations of being a student… *sigh*
In other news, has anyone figured out what our possible idea was?
~Kevin X
Don’t worry, We’re working!
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Sorry for the lack of updates recently, since the new year started school has taken full swing on our minds and sapped our ability to write a decent blog post (Ok that was a lame excuse but just go with it). But we have been working very hard toward our long-term goals! Don’t believe us? Here’s a quick run-through:
- Kevin has been pro-actively studying like a madman for the SATs on January 26 thus the lack of posts as the main author. This is one of the final obstacles in the way of his dream college and he is planning to go all out on this one and do his best so he will not have to worry about it ever again. He has forcefully reduced himself down to the “good asian student” and postponed all other aspects of “fun life” until after January 26.
- Kevin has also created a website for ThinkQuest about Dunbar’s Number. This was done in an extreme example of an all-nighter but on the plus side it looks awesome and he played with more code than was possible in a small amount of time. He hopes to get it uploaded online soon so our readers can see it, critique it, and become educated as well.
- Josh has run through several drafts and templates for a new design for the website. Below is his current draft and any suggestions, advice, critiques are HIGHLY appreciated: (click for larger view)
- Josh has also been thinking about a new section for all our various ideas and projects. One of the main things that we lack is credibility and even though we are slowly building it up, we want a place on our blog to store all that stuff too. Kind of like an informal online portfolio so people know that we are serious and not just kids playing around. This will take some tweaking of the Wordpress code but if anyone knows an easier way to do this then please leave a comment!
That would be considered hard work right? Well we hope it all pays off in the long run. The fun thing about having a blog and dreaming of a startup is that you really don’t know where you are going to end up. Enjoy the ride as they say.
To conclude, we also have an idea! It’s not a super-big idea like Facebook but it is an idea and we might go for it. One thing we do know is that it hasn’t been taken in any which way or form so thats really good. It might lead to something and it isn’t that hard to create either (we think…).
We feel like being a tease so let’s say that it is a rare topic mentioned on blogs but everyone has one and it starts with the letter “B”. To make it more exciting, we are also going to give the first person that guesses it right Zen Habit’s E-Book Zen To Done by Leo Babauta for free! We are allowed to do this now since he released his copyright and we hope that someone can benefit from Leo’s guide for a simpler life!
~Can The World Hear Me
Ravejelly Guest Post!
Today we are presenting our very first guest post! The author is a fellow lad from Great Britain who instantly fell in love with our blog, our dream and our question, Can The World Hear Me? Part of our goal is also for the the world to hear other people too that have a strong message but don’t have a blog yet or currently no strong means to reach out to the 6 billion people out there. By having a contact in Britain, that means we are also going international 
Now without further ado, presenting “Seb Huckle, RaveJelly (Coming soon…)”