You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry – but you might do what I want

An article on Listverse offers an interesting take on how sometimes it’s worth losing our cool. Though one reason it’s interesting is that it’s also pragmatic. Here’s one section:

Negotiating is all about being levelheaded and outsmarting your opponent, right? Not entirely. All of our interpersonal interactions function on an emotional level as well as an intellectual one. Research shows that sometimes getting mad can help your case. People are programmed to be cautious around someone who is angry. Therefore, it can make the person whom you’re haggling with more cooperative if you get upset—they’ll try to give you stuff to appease you.

However, there are a few caveats to all of this. First of all, this usually only works with Europeans and Americans. Asian cultures find displays of anger during negations to be rude, so blowing your lid may hurt your case. Second, if you do get angry, it has to be real anger. If the guy opposite you thinks you’re faking it, they’ll actually increase their own demands. Researchers say that faking anger erodes trust. If they find out that you’re trying to game them, they’ll be less cooperative.

10 Surprisingly Pleasant Things You Get from Anger – Monte Richard, Listverse (9 October 2014)

Go on. Read the full piece for the other nine points.

Forget Con Air, this is AirCon

I relish the details behind things we take for granted and this story is about how air conditioning is replete with details and history:

But when air conditioning was first invented in the 1800s, hardly anyone actually wanted it. It took more than 100 years for AC to really catch on. This innovation took a long road, which Salvatore Basile explores in his new book, Cool: How Air Conditioning Changed Everything.

“I think there were many people who thought, ‘God made bad weather so you should just put up with it.’ And I think the idea of dealing with heat was to ignore it,” Basile told me in a recent phone interview.

Eventually, air conditioning did win out and ended up changing a lot — from where people live in the United States to the architecture of our buildings to even the evolution of computers. The interview with Basile is below:

How air conditioning changed America forever – Susannah Locke, Vox.com (9 September 2014)

By the way, look at the address of the full feature. It’s “www.vox.com/2014/9/9/6124321/the-history-of-air-conditioning-is-more-interesting-than-it-sounds-i”. Apart from that errant i at the end, what I like is that this was almost certainly the original headline on the story. “The History of Air Conditioning is More Interesting Than It Sounds”. No surprise that it was changed to “How air conditioning changed America forever”.

Here’s the Salvatore Basile book.

Gizmodo on the apps we thought were cool

Oh, the shame. Today I use apps like OmniFocus and Evernote to get serious work done. Back when all this started in 2008, our tastes were less sophisticated. And I thought I was above all that as I read through Gizmodo’s mocking list of ex-cool apps like the iBeer and the pocket lightsabre.

And then I saw the last one on their list. I used that. I liked that. I am shamed.

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It’s Bubble wrap:

Just like its real-life counterpart, Bubble Wrap was a delight to those doing the popping and soul-crushingly obnoxious to everyone else. And yet—always satisfying.

The 9 Most Popular Apps No One Uses Anymore – Ashley Feinberg, Gizmodo (21 July 2014)

Please read the full list and share in my shame.