Working From Home Doesn’t Have to Cut You Off From Humanity

Working from home doesn’t have to rob you of all human contact. Tavis Coburn

You've seen it in spam comments on the web, on flyers taped to utility poles, shouted at you from your inbox and late-night TV: Work from home, earn thousands of dollars a week! Ha ha, who would ever fall for … actually, maybe that spam is onto something. After all, who doesn't know someone who works from home? My wife and I moved to San Francisco from New York a year ago, and she still works for the same firm—East Coast hours, meetings via webcam, the whole deal. Our upstairs neighbor is doing pretty much the same thing.

It's easy to dismiss these two cases as fringe on the carpet of labor, but they're not: According to Global Workplace Analytics (they analyze workplaces globally), 2.6 percent of Americans work remotely more than half the time. That's 3.3 million people—more than live in Chicago—and a lot of jokes about the [insert neighborhood] satellite office.

But this is just rich folks with fancy degrees, fancy computers, and enterprise-grade broadband, right? Nope. Many remote jobs are accessible to people without a college education. You can use your household data pipe to work in a virtual call center, take airline reservations, help people get health insurance, and more. Some of those email come-ons, it turns out, can lead to employment. Which raises a question: How are these millions of people not totally insane?

Sometimes when I get home from work, it's like my wife has been stranded on an island and I'm the first human she's seen in years. (Sorry, honey, for crossing the work/home divide. ) She is not alone in feeling alone. According to GWA, 15 percent of remote workers express feelings of isolation without an office to call not-home. That's serious solitude.

These crazy-making effects are something Jason Fried has put a lot of thought into. Fried is a cofounder of Basecamp. Since 1999, people have used its collaboration software to work from cafés, beaches, and parents' basements across the globe. And, walking the walk, 45-person Basecamp boasts employees in 30 cities worldwide. It does have an office, but not entirely for the reason you'd expect.

There are only 13 employees in Chicago, where that office is located, but they all work from home frequently. Fried says its most important function is as a hub for a twice-a-year meetup: “We call it the Meetup. I know, kind of an unoriginal name.” The name might not be a revelation, but the event itself is forward-thinking: Basecamp flies everyone to Chicago, puts them up in a hotel for a week, and encourages them to hang out.

But it isn't just a party; it's about creating corporate culture across so many miles. “Communication is often really subtle,” Fried says. “When you see a chat or an email, being able to picture someone helps you connect the dots.” Face-to-face contact reveals nonverbal cues that office workers take for granted. Basecamp also encourages staff to form ad hoc meetups. By “encourages,” I mean pays for.

Fried: “The support team got a house some weekend, and we paid for it.”

Me: “Wait, you paid for it?”

Fried: “Yes.”

Me [to self]: “Sheeeeet.”

Fried also tries to nurture relationships in less spendy ways. He instituted a monthly Google Hangout where he and cofounder David Hansson discuss anything non-work-related with randomly selected employees. “It's a fun way to force spontaneity,” Fried says, charmingly unaware of, or unwilling to admit, the contradiction.

This kind of thinking is exactly what will make remote working more viable for more people, and that's a good goal. Working from home can be a real positive. It can save you money, let you spend more time with your kids, and even provide your spouse a sanity-saving dose of human contact.

Highly evolved bacteria found near hydrothermal vents: Iron-oxidizing bacteria found along Mid-Atlantic Ridge

Bacteria that live on iron were found for the first time at three well-known vent sites along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, one of the longest undersea mountain ranges in the world. Scientists report that these bacteria likely play an important role in deep-ocean iron cycling, and are dominant members of communities near and adjacent to sulfur-rich, black-smoker hydrothermal vents prevalent along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge. These unique chemosynthetic communities live off the chemical components in the vent fluid, rather than sunlight used by their photosynthetic counterparts. This specialized group of iron-oxidizing bacteria, Zetaproteobacteria, appears to be restricted to environments where iron is plentiful, which suggests that these bacteria are highly evolved to utilize iron as an energy source.

Parts of the ocean floor along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge are covered in patches of what looks like yellowish jelly. Scientists recovered some of this yellowish material using a novel, syringe-based sampler deployed by the remotely operated vehicle, Jason. The precision sampler was developed jointly by scientists at Bigelow Laboratory and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, and allows for unprecedented retrieval of delicate microbial mats from miles deep in the ocean. The collected material was found to be composed of millions of Zetaproteobacteria living off the iron. The results were reported in a PLoS ONE article published on March 11th.

"With each expedition to the Mid-Atlantic Ridge we learn more about its complex ecology," says Jarrod Scott, a postdoctoral researcher at Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences and lead author of the PLoS One article.

Researchers also conducted a meta-analysis, a review of published literature, to determine locations where Zetaproteobacteria have been observed. They found that Zetaproteobacteria were only detected in samples from iron-rich environments, which suggests these bacteria are highly evolved to utilize iron. Because iron is such a common element in the Earth's crust, it is possible these bacteria acquired these traits billions of years ago and have evolved to form their own unique lineage within the microbial world.

"Zetaproteobacteria do not appear to be common members of water column microbial communities. Yet, if I were to hang an iron bar in the ocean, wait a few days, they would appear there because of an available food source. Finding out where and how they know where food is and relocate to use it, is but one of the many mysteries that remain to be solved, " adds Scott.

The paper also suggested that iron from vent water near and adjacent to hydrothermal vents (diffuse flow systems) may be an important iron source into the deep ocean. This is important because iron can be an important limiting nutrient in the open ocean.

Scott was joined on the paper by John A. Breier of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, George W. Luther III of the University of Delaware, and his Bigelow Laboratory colleague, David Emerson.

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The above story is based on materials provided by Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences . Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

The True* Origin Story of the New MacBook

The True* Origin Story of the New MacBook

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*This is almost certainly not true. But it is definitely funny.

Now You Can Play Cards Against Humanity on Your Phone

Heres the scenario: you’re at the park with a handful of friends. You’ve got your picnic blanket, snacks, and beer. Everyone’s in a great mood. “Hey, let’s play Cards Against Humanity !” someone says. It’s a great idea, except you can’t, because nobody lugged the game’s big black box of cards to the park.

Or maybe you did bring the set of cards—bigger, blacker box and all. But then a gust of wind kicks up and sweeps everything halfway across the field. That’s a bigger bummer than being shipped a literal box of crap.

Lucky for you, dear reader, these are now issues of the past. An ingenious fellow named Dawson Whitfield has built Cards Against Originality, a shameless ripoff of the mega-popular party game for horrible people packaged as a handy website/app for smartphones, tablets, and computers.

How shameless? Well, it’s not original at all. Cards Against Originality isn’t “inspired by” CAH or anything—it’s the actual cards. All the originals, plus all five expansions. The app “is intended to fill in when you forget your physical cards,” Whitfield says on the website. “This is a shameless copy of the real Cards Against Humanity . They deserve all the credit.”

The app is 100 percent free. To play, just hit the “new game” button and share a link with your friends—the app handles the rest.

The bigger question: Is it legal? Actually, yes! Cards Against Humanity is available under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 2.0 license, which means anyone can use, remix, and share the game for free—so long as they don’t sell it without permission or steal the name. The game has always been available as a free PDF download for those who want to make their own cards—the game’s $25 price is purely paying for the official physical cards.

“We obviously think that the game is best played in real life with cards,” Cards Against Humanity creator Max Temkin told WIRED. “If we thought it was fun to play on an app, we would have made an app ourselves. That being said, it’s extremely cool to see projects like this come out of our Creative Commons license. It’s why we’ve always shared the game in a free and open way.”

In other words, party on, you horrible people.

Kleiner Lawyer: Ellen Pao Made a Co-Worker Cry

Ellen Pao exits San Francisco Superior Court, March 10, 2015. Josh Valcarcel/WIRED

Apparently Lynne Hermle isn’t the only one who can make people unhappy.

The attorney defending Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers against a gender discrimination suit brought by former partner Ellen Pao has a reputation for being so tough she reportedly once made a rival throw up. But in her questioning of the plaintiff on the witness stand today, Hermle convincingly established that Pao herself had once made a colleague cry.

Under questioning from Hermle, Pao confirmed that she once called former partner Trae Vassallo “untrustworthy” to her face, and that she’d heard Vassallo crying in her office over the comment.

Hermle also revealed emails Pao had apparently sent to her managers, with bullet points for each item on which Pao thought Vassallo could improve. In one email to her mentor, famed VC John Doerr, Pao wrote of Vassallo, “Let me know when you think I’ve overstepped, but I think I have to break some glass to make it happen, and I’m not afraid to do it.”

The attacks on Pao’s character are at the heart of Kleiner’s strategy to show that her lack of advancement at the firm was not due to gender discrimination but to Pao herself. Throughout the morning, Hermle tried to show that Pao’s managers had tried to help Pao move past a failed relationship with a coworker; that Pao herself had conflicts with many colleagues during her tenure; and that she was willfully misinterpreting events to prop up her lawsuit.

Pao Emails Point to Inconsistencies

Under questioning from her own lawyers this week, Pao portrayed Kleiner Perkins as a workplace where complaints fell upon deaf ears regardless of how many times they were raised, and where internal processes could not be depended upon to effect a much-needed change of culture within the company.

But Hermle produced an email trail in court today that suggested Pao herself failed to heed attempts to help her navigate past a tumultuous relationship with a co-worker.

In her lawsuit, Pao alleged that Kleiner managing partner Ray Lane pushed her into having lunch with a former colleague, Ajit Nazre. Pao had had an affair with Nazre, whom she claims retaliated against her when the relationship ended. In mid-2007, Pao previously testified, Lane asked her to have lunch with Nazre to help them move past the conflict. During that lunch, Pao said, Nazre accosted her, telling her he loved her and then following her to her car in the parking lot, which made Pao uncomfortable.

Let me know when you think I’ve overstepped, but I think I have to break some glass to make it happen, and I’m not afraid to do it. Ellen Pao

But Hermle presented an email that showed Pao herself had asked Nazre out to that infamous lunch. In other emails sent by Pao to Nazre from later in the day after the lunch, Pao used warm and friendly language. “You really are amazing at what you do and you shouldn’t let anyone take that away from you. You’re the only person in the office…who gives me consistent, productive feedback,” Pao wrote.

Pao also confirmed under questioning that she had to conveyed to Doerr that she could continue to have a professional and collegiate relationship with Nazre. “It’s a real honor to be thought of as your surrogate daughter,” Pao wrote in one email to Doerr, adding that she was sorry she didn’t live up to the distinction.

“Did you mean you didn’t live up to it by having a relationship with a coworker?” Hermle asked Pao. Pao said she did not recall.

Pao Dissatisfied

In her cross-exam, Hermle also sought to establish that Pao was often dissatisfied at work. In discussing one piece of evidence, Pao’s 2009 self-review, Pao previously testified that Doerr asked for a revision because he found it “too self-promotional.” But in an email Doerr sent to Pao, he wrote, “In several places I sense resentment in your self-review.”

Hermle also tried to show that Pao had rocky relationships with several of her coworkers, and often complained about them to managers. She suggested Pao had arguments with assistants over being late, and resented coworkers for personal time off if that meant she had to pick up the extra work.

In her suit, Pao alleged that a more senior colleague, Randy Komisar, had inappropriately given her what she described as an erotic book of poetry on Valentine’s Day, Leonard Cohen’s “Book of Longing.” Pao also alleged that Komisar invited her out to dinner when his wife was out of town.

Hermle called Pao’s interpretation of the incident into question, establishing that Komisar had not made any advances toward Pao before the incident, and never made any advances after it. Pao admitted that Komisar may not have read the book or known that it was sexual in nature, and the invitation to dinner could have been a benign, friendly gesture that she misinterpreted. Pao conceded that she did not recount the incident to an internal investigator Kleiner had hired to look into her allegations of gender bias at the firm in early 2012.

Pao was terminated from Kleiner Perkins in October 2012. Her suit alleges that her managers passed her over for promotion while letting her less-qualified male peers advance. She also claims when she raised her concerns about an offensive boy’s club culture at the firm, and that she was penalized for complaining. The trial, now into its twelfth day, has captivated Silicon Valley, where women are still in the distinct minority despite efforts to increase diversity.

Google CFO’s Touching Farewell Note Almost Redeems Google+

Patrick Pichette, Senior Vice President & Chief Financial Officer at Google. Google

Patrick Pichette started working at Google when its only social network was called Orkut and stayed long enough to see its most ambitious effort, Google+, wither. But on his way out, the soon-to-be-ex-chief financial officer finally figured out what Google+ was good for: the Google resignation letter.

Pichette’s farewell, posted yesterday, is getting attention not so much because of what it means for Google’s C-suite but for its revealing look into the psyche of a powerful tech exec.

Yes, the 52-year-old Pichette said he wanted to spend more time with his family. But the way he said it appears to have spoken to the frustrations of overworked professionals everywhere who, whatever the successes they’ve achieved, wonder when they finally get to feel like they succeeded.

“While I am not looking for sympathy, I want to share my thought process because so many people struggle to strike the right balance between work and personal life,” wrote Pichette, who started at Google nearly seven years ago.

In the post, Pichette describes an epiphany he had while climbing Mount Kilimanjaro with his wife, Tamar. What if, his wife asked him, they just kept going? Not back to work, but out into the wider world.

“I would love to keep going,” Pichette said he told her, “but we have to go back. It’s not time yet, There is still so much to do at Google.

“But then she asked the killer question: So when is it going to be time? Our time? My time? The questions just hung there in the cold morning African air.”

In the end, Pichette says, he couldn’t ultimately come up with a better answer than now. The couple’s kids are grown. He has worked straight for “about 1500 weeks,” he says. And though he’s been married almost 25 years, work appears to have always come first.

“When our kids are asked by their friends about the success of the longevity of our marriage, they simply joke that Tamar and I have spent so little time together that ‘it’s really too early to tell’ if our marriage will in fact succeed.”

One nice thing about all that work is that, for Pichette at least, it’s apparently given him the financial security to leave the work world and seek personal fulfillment at a relatively young age—a luxury that many people will never know, no matter how hard they work. But Pichette appears to appreciate the opportunity he has, and in doing so has spoken a truth that is nearly taboo in corporate life, especially in the work-addicted culture of Silicon Valley: you are not just your job.

“In the end, life is wonderful, but nonetheless a series of trade offs, especially between business/professional endeavours and family/community,” Pichette writes. “And thankfully, I feel I’m at a point in my life where I no longer have to have to make such tough choices anymore.”

Graphene: A new tool for fighting cavities and gum disease?

Dental diseases, which are caused by the overgrowth of certain bacteria in the mouth, are among the most common health problems in the world. Now scientists have discovered that a material called graphene oxide is effective at eliminating these bacteria, some of which have developed antibiotic resistance. They report the findings in the journal ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces.

Zisheng Tang and colleagues point out that dentists often prescribe traditional antibiotics to get rid of bacteria that cause tooth decay or gum disease. But with the rise in antibiotic resistance, new approaches are needed to address these problems, which can lead to tooth loss. Previous studies have demonstrated that graphene oxide -- carbon nanosheets studded with oxygen groups -- is a promising material in biomedical applications. It can inhibit the growth of some bacterial strains with minimal harm to mammalian cells. Tang's team wanted to see if the nanosheets would also stop the specific bacteria that cause dental diseases.

In the lab, the researchers tested the material against three different species of bacteria that are linked to tooth decay and gum disease. By destroying the bacterial cell walls and membranes, graphene oxide effectively slowed the growth of the pathogens. The researchers conclude that the nanosheets could have potential uses in dental care.

The authors acknowledge funding from the Shanghai Natural Science Foundation and the Hospital-Public Cross-Link Project of Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

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The above story is based on materials provided by American Chemical Society . Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.