5 Phrases That Can Boost Employee Morale

I left the company years ago for another but I still run into former colleagues. Usually the ensuing conversation involves something along the lines of, “Hey, did you hear about the (latest management decision I think is really stupid) at the plant?” This question was different. “You worked there for almost 20 years,” my ex-coworker said. “Is there anything you wish you could go back and do over?" I thought about it later. Instead I most regret the things I didn't say: To employees who reported to me, to some of my peers, and to at least one person I worked for. It's too late for me, but it’s not too late for you. “That was great how you...” Feel free to go back in time. “Can you help me...?” Even though I could tell he really wanted to participate, I never let him. Asking someone for help implicitly recognizes their skills and value. And there’s a bonus: You get help. “I'm sorry I didn't...” Say you're sorry. Say you're sorry, say why you're sorry, and take all the blame.

Virtual Currency Is The Next Big Platform Editor’s note: Ari Mir is the co-founder and CEO of virtual currency platform Pocket Change. He also co-founded GumGum.com, the world’s largest in-image ad-network. This week, Mir is attending the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco. My youth was spent jumping turtles, killing 16-bit Nazis, connecting kickflips with manuals and nube tubing. Haaaaadouken! Like most boys and young men during the ’80s and early ’90s, I loved video games. For two decades, selling hard and soft copies of games proved to be a very lucrative business. Virtual goods are purchased with virtual currency, a digital medium of exchange similar to dollars and cents. The advertising industry has already seized the opportunity. Engaging with advertisers won’t be the only way to earn virtual currency. As millions of users begin to build liquidity in a system such as FB Credits or other virtual currency providers it becomes possible to disrupt the trillion dollar mobile payments space. [image via flickr/epSos.de]

7th Graders Publish Their Own Textbook Mac Life wrote an article titled Super 7th Graders Publish Their Own eBook to the iBookstore. It explains the project in more detail. "Each student has to choose an organisms they wanted to study and were required to submit their topic for approval. Afterward, students had to write informative – but entertaining! – articles about their organism." Andrea collected work from 69 students and entered it into iBooks Author. iBooks Author is free but only works on Macs running 10.7 Lion or higher. iBooks Author is a fantastically powerful tool. There are some disadvantages to using iBooks author for crafting your own learning materials. Check out what Andrea and her students say about writing their book. I think the comment by CNEBBY in the Customer Reviews of Creatures, Plants and More sums up the project well: "This is an awesome example of what kids can do when they are properly motivated by a skilled teacher."

Light From Universe’s First Stars Seen – Space.com | News Ultraviolet and visible light emitted by all the stars that ever existed is still coursing through the universe. Astronomers refer to this “fog” of starlight as the extragalactic background light (EBL). Image released Nov. 1, 2012. CREDIT: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center Astronomers have spotted light from the very first stars in the universe, which are almost as old as time itself. Shortly after the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago, the universe cooled enough to let atoms form, which eventually clumped together to create the first stars . Now, astronomers have detected this glow — called the extragalactic background light, or EBL — and have separated out the light from later stars, isolating the contribution from the first stars that ever existed. “The EBL is the ensemble of photons generated by all the stars and also all the black holes in the universe,” said astrophysicist Marco Ajello of the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory in California, who led the research.

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