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ChainGPT Pad Launches OMNIA Protocol To Enhance And Secure Web3 For DeFi Users Via DePIN And MEV
DOVER, DE, USA, May 7, 2024 — ChainGPT, the AI-powered Web3 infrastructure providing a diverse suite of tools and services, will exclusively launch the IDO of its latest launchpad project: OMNIA Protocol, a specialized RPC (remote procedure call) provider solving a wide range of challenges in DeFi relating to decentralization, security, compliance, and user experience. Set for May 9, OMNIA Protocol's IDO leverages the ChainGPT Pad and its incubation program to launch the $OMNIA token—supporting the wider blockchain ecosystem through a seamless interface combining decentralization, real-time pending transaction streams, liquidity aggregation, and more. As a premier decentralized fundraising and incubation platform for Web3 projects of all types, the ChainGPT Pad has been recognized as the most popular launchpad of 2023. The incubation program promotes emerging startups strategically hand-picked by ChainGPT based on their disruptive potential, transforming their ideas into viable business solutions. The program extensively assists in product development, smart contract implementation, and user engagement. Through expert mentorship and access to an extensive network of influential partners and investors, the ChainGPT Pad's incubation provides Web3 startups with the tools to navigate and thrive. OMNIA Protocol lays the foundation for state-of-the-art solutions to build on top of its infrastructure by leveraging the Proposer-Builder Separation (PBS) to facilitate the private order flow of transactions. This allows OMNIA to not only guarantee front-running, or sandwich, attack protection but also opens the door for innovative business use cases leveraging good MEV (maximal extractable value), transaction bundles, and intent-based dApps to reduce transaction fees and potentially earn cash back on every DeFi trade a user executes. Furthermore, OMNIA plans to decentralize the node measurement process on top of EigenLayer by building a special-purpose Actively Validated Service (AVS) to facilitate transparent governance over node performance and integrity checks—all while tapping into billions of dollars as part of EigenLayer's TVL. The OMNIA Protocol boasts several other key products geared toward fostering a more robust, secure, and decentralized blockchain environment, including: Robust RPC infrastructure: Provides the foundation for blockchain interactions with added features for security, compliance, and more. Decentralized Node Incentivization: Encourages community members to run nodes to strengthen the network and ensure its decentralized nature. MEV Infrastructure Monetization: Leverages MEV strategies to capture value and redistribute it to users. Staking nodes: Offers staking opportunities for token holders to participate and earn rewards. Additionally, the KYT suite effortlessly integrates with existing AML/KYC workflows and adheres to OFAC (U.S.), UN and EU guidelines for mitigating financial crimes and terror financing. Untrusted entities coupled with aggregators must stake to earn a high level of trust, thus being able to provide higher levels of traffic. Each community node will stake $OMNIA to join the network, with nodes committing to a specific uptime and synchronization. Token holders will also enjoy fee reductions with the more $OMNIA they hold. ChainGPT is a pioneer in the field of blockchain AI infrastructure, offering a wide range of tools and services, including a smart contract generator and auditor, advanced AI trading, an NFT generator, an AI-powered security extension, and SDK and API access for developers and organizations to integrate ChainGPT. “OMNIA is one of our most promising projects and it was a pleasure to collaborate with them to support their mission of opening access to 40 blockchain networks,” says Ilan Rakhmanov, CEO and Founder of ChainGPT. “OMNIA has demonstrated its ability to bridge the gap between centralized providers offering strong functionality and decentralized RPCs that tend to lack advanced capabilities through resource clustering and effortlessly incorporating MEV extraction. Their IDO symbolized a unique opportunity for ChainGPT to support a project that is truly building the foundations for a better Web3, for everyone” ‘Working closely with ChainGPT during the incubation period allowed us to accelerate the development of our truly innovative protocol,” says Cristian Lupascu, CEO of OMNIA Protocol. “Thanks to our talented team and the ChainGPT Pad providing us with a strategic partner and strong foundation for success, we will bring about unprecedented progress in blockchain accessibility, security, and democratization.” n About ChainGPT: ChainGPT is the leading provider of AI-powered infrastructure for crypto, blockchain, and Web3. From a next-generation IDO launchpad and incubator to automated smart contract generation and auditing, as well as an advanced Web3 AI chatbot to AI-powered news aggregation, an AI training assistant, cross-chain swap, and an NFT generator, ChainGPT is a sophisticated, end-to-end solution for AI Web3 infrastructure. By integrating large language models (LLM) with blockchain, the company builds advanced, accessible, and user-friendly tools for all users. Further solidifying its position at the forefront of technological innovation, ChainGPT has established strategic partnerships and received recognition from notable tech leaders such as Google, Nvidia, BNBChain, and Chainlink. ChainGPT aims to advance the use of AI within the blockchain space. For more information, visit: https://www.chaingpt.org About Omnia Protocol: Founded in 2021, OMNIA Protocol is a specialized RPC provider designed by cybersecurity, cryptographers, and software engineers to address the unique challenges of DeFi. It champions decentralization, aggregation, and the redistribution of MEV (maximal extractable value) while prioritizing security and transaction optimization. OMNIA's mission is to provide a seamless blockchain interface that combines decentralization with advanced features like real-time pending transaction streams and robust broadcasting. By strategically leveraging MEV, OMNIA empowers DeFi traders, wallets, dApps, and DEXs to directly benefit from the value generated by their transactions. :::tip This story was distributed as a release by Btcwire under HackerNoon's Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program here. :::
ChainGPT Pad Launches OMNIA Protocol To Enhance And...
DOVER, DE, USA, May 7, 2024 — ChainGPT, the AI-powered Web3 infrastructure providing...
Source: Hacker Noon
How to Start a Career in Product Marketing: 10 Expert Tips (2024)
Six months ago, I heard about product marketing from a friend. This was surprising because I had been doing content marketing and brand marketing for close to three years, and so the term product marketing seemed like a gateway to nowhere. After searching for the term online, I was shocked. Product marketing is a lot different from other forms of marketing that you know. I'm excited that you're transitioning to be a product marketing manager soon, and that's why I created this article to help you on this journey. In this article, you'll find the skills needed to break into product marketing, the difference between product marketing and product management, and one-on-one interviews with product marketing experts from various fields to help you get started. What is product marketing? Product marketing is the art of bringing a product to market. It involves developing a go-to-market strategy and deciding the product's messaging and positioning. This means deciding on the message, position, launch, and overall sales plan of the product. According to April Dunford, product marketers are the people responsible for being able to deeply understand and, therefore, articulate what is different, better, and remarkable about your offering. Many marketers make the mistake of assuming that because their product is simple, customers will understand it. Or because the marketers themselves place so much emphasis on the product, they assume that the audience should desire it as much without considering if the product is needed in the marketplace. They assume prospects will know the value of the product because it seems obvious. But without a clear message that reaches the right people, demonstrates the product's value, and counters objections, even the best products will struggle. Product Manager vs Product Marketing Manager According to Drift, a product manager's job is to define and build new products and features. It's the product marketer's job to commercialize those products—drive demand, revenue, and adoption for those things. To put it another way, the product manager is responsible for understanding the problem that their customers are facing and then scoping and building a solution. The product marketer owns the strategy for go-to-market and defines the product's position in the marketplace. A product marketing manager (PMM) is in charge of the product marketing of a particular brand. Here is a list of what a Product Marketing Manager does: They are the bridge between the product engineers and the end user. They are the voice of the customer. They are responsible for crafting out the positioning and messaging that align with a brand's target audience. They are responsible for taking a product to market, also known as the go-to-market strategy. This involves naming, packaging and pricing, partner activation, positioning, enablement, top-of-the-funnel and middle-of-the-funnel content, campaigns, and offers. They empower the sales team with offers, value propositions, and other resources to increase their sales targets. They define the pricing strategy to maximize revenue as well as the channels and partnerships to expand the product reach. Collaborating with product, sales, and engineering teams to optimize the product. Planning events and webinars to generate buzz throughout the product lifestyle. Crafting compelling content to both attract and educate potential buyers and Monitoring product feedback and market information Communication, storytelling, content asset development, project management, collaboration, negotiation, and understanding customers' needs and behaviors are some of the skills used by a product marketing manager. 10 Experts give perspective on the subject of Product Marketing. 1. Lilia Tovbin, CEO and Founder of BigMailer How did you get into Product marketing? I stumbled into product marketing by merging my passion for technology and communication. Initially, I started as a content creator but gradually realized the power of translating complex features into tangible benefits for users. This realization happened because of my innate ability to empathize with our target audience, which helped me shape our product messaging effectively and fix customer pain points. What were some of your successes? In a recent product launch, our team introduced an AI-powered analytics tool for email marketers. I conducted in-depth interviews with email marketers and dissected their challenges to understand them better. The insights guided our product positioning and allowed us to develop case studies showcasing real-world improvements post-implementation. These elevated our product's market presence and helped us establish a deeper connection with our users. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? Start by understanding the market and consumer behavior. Develop skills in digital marketing and content creation, and learn to use analytics tools to measure your impact. 2. Shawn Plummer, CEO of The Annuity Expert. How did you get into Product marketing? Product marketing in the financial sector is about creating and promoting financial products that meet specific client needs, emphasizing their benefits in a clear, understandable way. My path to product marketing began with my finance background, which naturally led me to specialize in product marketing, focusing on customer-centric solutions. To be good at product marketing, you need analytical thinking skills, empathy for client needs, and clear communication. What were some of your successes? We introduced a tailored annuity plan by identifying market needs, developing clear messaging, and using targeted channels for promotion. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? Understand your product deeply and the customers it serves. Knowledge of market research and digital marketing tools is also beneficial. 3. Peter Hoopis, President and Owner of Hoopis Pickleball How did you get into Product marketing? I got into product marketing because I loved sports and had a knack for identifying market trends. My journey started in digital analytics, analyzing user behaviors, which naturally evolved into devising product strategies that align with consumer interests. My adaptability has allowed me to thrive in this field and seamlessly pivot between data-driven insights and creative storytelling. What were some of your successes? I remember one memorable project I worked on that involved launching pickleball backpacks. We saw a gap in the market for gear designed specifically for pickleball players. The backpacks had dedicated spots for paddles, breathable sections for sweaty clothes, and a sleek design. We told a simple story about how these backpacks were must-haves for pickleball lovers. We teamed up with popular players, threw events at tournaments, and shared pictures and videos on social media. The response was great, showing that a clear and relatable story can make a product not just useful but also something people genuinely want. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? Have a passion for your product, learn about digital trends, understand your target audience, and be creative in your approach. 4. Tolu Olubanke, Marketing Manager at Bloc. How did you get into Product marketing? My product marketing journey began with social media management during my studies at the university. I transitioned to content marketing shortly after and finally landed at Bloc, where I discovered my passion for product marketing. This progression allowed me to leverage my storytelling skills to connect with audiences and champion innovative products. What were some of your successes? Leading successful product launches and GTM campaigns for FinTech products has been incredibly rewarding. My career growth is another source of pride. In product marketing, collaboration is key. Mastering stakeholder management and effectively advocating for your ideas are also crucial skills I've honed. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? For aspiring product marketers, I recommend finding a mentor—someone experienced and knowledgeable who can guide your career. Mentorship accelerates learning and problem-solving. Additionally, prioritize relevant work experience—volunteer, network, and seek opportunities that align with your goals. Product marketing in our field is about positioning and promoting educational products to the right audience, emphasizing their value and benefits. 5. Zach Dannett, Founder and CEO of Tumble How did you get into Product marketing? I started in product marketing largely as a way to learn how I would best introduce and demonstrate the value of Tumble. I've always believed that understanding your product's unique value is the first step in crafting a compelling marketing angle for your product that would become the backbone of a successful product. For me, that meant living and breathing every aspect of Tumble's offerings. I actively engaged with our target audience, sought feedback, and iterated our messaging based on real-world responses. It's a continuous cycle of learning, adapting, and refining. My passion for real estate and education naturally led me to product marketing. The essential skills for my growth are market analysis, strategic planning, and effective communication, which have been key to my success. What were some of your successes? There are three interconnected skills that I think are critical for our success: insightful customer analysis, innovative thinking, and focused data utilization. For instance, at Tumble, we meticulously analyze customer feedback and market trends, using this data to drive creative marketing strategies that speak to our audience's needs and preferences. We also make sure to combine creative ideas with solid, qualitative data for our marketing campaigns to make sure that they resonate and convert. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? For newcomers to product marketing, the path forward involves fusing education and practical experience. When we first introduced Tumble, we started by deeply diving into market research and consumer behavior studies to understand the daily challenges faced by families with children and pets. We then applied this understanding to small, focused projects—like targeted social media campaigns and community engagement events. These smaller campaigns allowed us to test our theories and provided invaluable hands-on experience for us. 6. James Smith, Founder of Travel-Lingual How did you get into Product marketing? It all started with my intense interest in innovation and technology. After finishing my marketing degree, I had the opportunity to join a technology startup, where I acquired significant experience working with the product team. This event sparked my interest in aligning product development with client requirements. Passionate about exploring this convergence, I transitioned to product marketing and have not experienced any regrets. The sector of product marketing is constantly changing and requires a diverse set of talents. Primarily, having great communication skills is essential. As a product marketer, your role is vital in bridging the complex technical features of the product with language that effectively appeals to buyers. Possessing a robust analytical mentality is crucial for collecting and interpreting facts to make well-informed strategic decisions. Additionally, it is imperative to maintain adaptability and implement appropriate modifications to your tactics in light of shifting market trends and client feedback. In this highly competitive market, having a deep understanding of your target audience and the ability to genuinely comprehend their demands will ultimately set you apart. What were some of your successes? We sought to create a comprehensive travel helper that fulfills the needs of both leisure and business travelers. I devised a comprehensive plan to guarantee the effective launch of this product. Initially, comprehensive market research was carried out to ascertain the target demographic, their areas of dissatisfaction, and current rivals. The crucial factor in establishing Travel Companion as a unique and unparalleled product in the industry was our ability to position it effectively. Subsequently, I collaborated closely with the product team to acquire a comprehensive comprehension of the application's functionalities and unique selling points. I developed compelling communication that resonated deeply with our target demographic by leveraging my expertise. The product descriptions of our software were meticulously designed to demonstrate its ability to address typical travel difficulties and improve the overall travel experience. I designed an all-encompassing marketing strategy that extends across several platforms to guarantee optimal outreach. The plan involved using social media platforms, partnering with travel influencers, and deploying targeted web ads. In addition, we engaged in travel expos and orchestrated demonstrations to generate enthusiasm among prospective users. Following the launch, I carefully analyzed user comments and data analytics to identify the required enhancement precisely. We delivered an exceptional user experience and developed client loyalty by continuously enhancing our services. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? Below is a comprehensive and systematic approach to assist individuals who aspire to become product marketers in initiating their careers: Acquire Knowledge: Dedicate time to familiarize yourself with marketing principles, market research, and consumer behavior. Online classes, professional blogs, and networking events offer valuable resources. Gain Experience: Seek internships, entry-level marketing, or volunteer positions. By engaging in this hands-on experience, you will acquire essential knowledge about the challenges encountered in the sector and cultivate a portfolio of noteworthy achievements. Acquire expertise from seasoned professionals: Keep yourself informed by following industry experts, engaging in webinars, and joining product marketing communities. Engage with industry professionals to gain useful insights and stay updated on the latest advancements. Improve your skills. Develop proficient communication, analytical, and strategic thinking capabilities. Acquire expertise in crafting compelling product narratives and learn how to explain complex information clearly and engagingly. Maintain a sense of curiosity regarding new technology, industry developments, and client preferences to maintain a competitive edge. Cultivate a mentality of expansion and consistently seek opportunities to enhance your comprehension. Develop a strong network. Build relationships with individuals with similar interests and expertise, engage in industry gatherings, and actively contribute to online groups. A resilient professional network can provide insight, important connections, and future employment opportunities. It is important to note that the journey towards being a product marketer may involve challenges. However, you can establish a fulfilling career in an ever-changing field by demonstrating dedication, passion, and a proactive mindset. Persist in broadening your knowledge, uphold a state of curiosity, and consistently acknowledge the significance of your unique perspective. 7. James DeLapa, Director of Digital Marketing at Wrike How did you get into Product marketing? I've been interested in marketing for as long as I can remember. Even as a kid, I remember the deep impact some ads had on me, and that passion never stopped. I love that we can use marketing to help connect with people through the stories we weave and leave their lives a little brighter. Largely, my curiosity is what drives my success. I'm not just creating strategies I think will work but looking at consumer behavior data or campaign feedback and always learning more. Holding onto that curiosity throughout your career keeps you pushing to improve and moving perpetually closer to delivering exactly what consumers want. What were some of your successes? At Wrike, we built a work management platform working with 20,000+ companies in over 140 different countries. Beyond increasing search volume, I bring conversion rate optimization, analytics, web development, and sales experience to create holistic strategies that have led our marketing team to great success. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? It's easiest to start with an entry-level marketing role, which often doesn't require a degree. If you don't have a marketing degree, start learning everything you can and creating mock ads, content, and more. Take some shorter certifications to get some educational experience behind your name, and even freelance to build a portfolio first that can land you a full-time gig later. My best advice is to keep learning and creating every single day so you can hone your craft. 8. Louis P. Lessor, Marketing Specialist at Davies. How did you get into product marketing? I entered the product marketing space about three years ago, but I have eight years of marketing experience working in a variety of marketing settings. The skills that have contributed to my successes are: Continuing learning: always taking new courses that come out and renewing certifications. Read industry news from Think with Google, Hubspot, Marketing Brew, and LinkedIn to see what the top players are doing. Networking: This involves finding people to give me different views on a variety of marketing matters. What were some of your successes? I am currently working with two startups to take two different products to market. Below is a simple framework I am using to market both of these products: Getting clear on the company's WHY. We are conducting market research both through in-person interviews and virtual surveys. Sending products to users for free to gather feedback and get reviews Creating a 0 Million Dollar Offer Building a landing page that collects email addresses will allow us to build a look and re-engage with anyone who still needs to purchase our product. Use the Storybrand framework to position our customers as the heroes of their stories. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? Take as many courses on marketing as you can from Google Ads, Hubspot, and SEMRush to understand the marketing ecosystem and how each works alongside the others. Read books such as 100 Million Dollar Offer, Purple Cow, Storybrand, and many more; lifelong learning will help you continue to be at the top of your field. Network with people who push you to be better every day and offer different views on everything. Practice your craft on a personal project to develop your skills. 9. Anastasiia Kinichenko, Product Marketing Lead, SE Ranking. How did you get into product marketing? I started as a T-shaped digital marketer; then, my focus switched to email marketing. I worked with funnels and, after a while, shifted towards the retention direction. My interest gradually pivoted to the tasks handled by product marketers, which is now my area of specialization. In my opinion, this role requires a blend of creativity and analytical thinking. You start by dealing with numbers and tables and reading data, and then you leverage these insights to build communication, visuals, and user interaction channels. This is a field where you never stop experimenting: you formulate a hypothesis, run a test, make conclusions, and then start the cycle anew with a fresh hypothesis. This is what makes this job so incredibly interesting and far from boring. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? If you want to work in this role, I recommend starting with the marketing fundamentals. You need to understand how demand and supply work, learn the main metrics, and how they are calculated and used. If you've been in marketing for a while and have some background, you can evolve into a strong product marketer if you have a desire to learn and grow in this field. 10. Debbie Moran, Marketing Manager at RecurPost. How did you get into product marketing? I got into product marketing at RecurPost because I really liked understanding our users and how our products could help them. I started in a general marketing role and slowly moved into product marketing because I saw the connection between what we offer at RecurPost and what our users were looking for. Being flexible has been super important. Our products change, and so does what our users need. Good communication is also a big deal because it helps me tell everyone about the cool things RecurPost does. Looking at data smartly is a must, and caring a lot about what our users want keeps everything on the right track. What were some of your successes? Let's talk about when we introduced the "Smart Scheduler" at RecurPost. We knew users wanted an easier way to plan their posts, so we asked them what they needed. We made sure to explain how this new feature could save them time. We used social media, tutorials, and webinars to show everyone how it worked. After it launched, we kept listening to users and made the Smart Scheduler even better based on what they told us. What advice would you recommend to newbies in product marketing? When I was new at RecurPost, I started by really understanding our products and talking to users. I joined projects that involved different teams, like the product team and customer support. Learning about marketing trends and taking some special training courses helped me get better. RecurPost encourages trying out new ideas, and that's a great way for newbies to learn. Starting from a newbie to becoming a marketing manager meant being hands-on, curious, and always ready to learn and try new things. Steps forward: Learn the basics of marketing. While it's not compulsory to have an MBA in marketing before you begin to pursue a career, it helps to know some basics in the marketing field before you start. This included the world of social media marketing, content creation, digital marketing, and communication. These skills give you an understanding of what marketing is and how you can use it to accomplish your goals. Network within the product marketing industry. This is critical for getting your first role as a product marketing manager. Connect with product marketers on Slack groups, LinkedIn channels, and other social platforms. This helps you gain ground in your style and knowledge of product marketing. Also, it helps you get familiar with all the terms associated with the industry. Some of the product marketing communities includeAfrican Product Marketing Pioneers, Product Marketing Hive, and ConTech Africa. Learn about Product Marketing While this is a no-brainer, it is critical to your success on the journey to product marketing. You need to understand and be able to articulate concepts like win/loss interviews, positioning, messaging, sales enablement, user personas, and much more. There are also courses you can take from CXL, Utiva, LinkedIn Learning, and many more to increase your knowledge gap within this new industry. Work on a side project to get your hands dirty. This is critical to your success as a product marketing manager. Pick a brand because you love their products. It may be Apply, Toyota, Kellogg, Mary Kay, Samsung, or even McDonald's. Study their user demography; this is the ideal customer that the company markets to. Create a customer for them based on their needs, targets, and aspirations that will align with their brand strategy. This will give you a perspective on how to create a user persona. After this, create a content calendar for a week that will speak to the user persona you've created. Create content for social media and a blog post, too. Move on to advertising. Create an ad for this persona and some follow-up emails that will speak to them. In essence, experiment with your learning so as to get the full scope of your product marketing career. Conclusions In summary, securing a role in product marketing requires a tailored resume showcasing core skills and relevant experiences. Research the company thoroughly before interviews to avoid basic questions and demonstrate genuine interest. Instead, inquire about their customer feedback strategies and future objectives. Adapt your communication style to match the company culture, showing sensitivity and flexibility. Emphasize your openness to learning and ability to receive feedback positively, highlighting your passion, creativity, and quick learning skills. Authenticity is crucial; avoid pretending to have expertise when it doesn't exist. Instead, convey your enthusiasm and willingness to contribute. By following these steps, you'll increase your chances of success in the competitive field of product marketing. If you want to learn more about product marketing, I just wrote a guide to this path. Here, you will find links to videos, podcasts, books, travel visas, and other valuable resources explaining the concept of product marketing. My hope is that with these resources, you will not only gather enough knowledge in the field of product marketing but also skillfully navigate the challenges you will face and, most importantly, secure your first paying role. n
How to Start a Career in Product Marketing: 10 Expert...
Six months ago, I heard about product marketing from a friend.
This was surprising...
Source: Hacker Noon
EigenLayer Airdrop Has Highlighted the Problems in the Crypto Market
Hi everyone, Daria Strategy here 🙌🏻 I'm a Growth Marketer, Brand Strategist and Communications expert working with blockchain and crypto projects. I create additional value and build brand awareness of the Web3 companies among users, developers, and VC funds. Recently, the crypto market exploded with news about the airdrop of EigenLayer, the most hyped Ethereum restaking platform. The conditions for receiving this drop caused an even greater explosion of emotions, discussions, and even hate. The project offers a platform for those who want to restake rather than the classic staking process that attracts regulators' attention. The emergence of EigenLayer and LRT restaking protocols increased ETH's share of staking to 26% of the total supply. According to DeFi Lama, EigenLayer is TVL's second-largest protocol on Ethereum after Lido, at .2 billion: An airdrop from EigenLayer canonically illustrates community expectations and market conditions. In this article, I explain what happened and what problems this case highlights in the crypto market. I also took a comment from my colleague, a product marketer who is now introducing a similar product to the market. Let's figure it out together! A short overview of the Eigen Layer Airdrop Over the last year, EigenLayer has become super popular because of the rethinking of Ethereum restaking and the big names of venture funds that have invested in this project (a16z crypto, Ethereal Ventures, Polychain Capital, Coinbase Ventures, etc.). The journalists of Blockworks recommend calling the EIGEN token generation event a “stake drop,” not “an airdrop. “ EIGEN can only be staked with EigenLabs' proof-of-concept/proof-of-value data availability service EigenDA, at least in the beginning, until other apps building with EigenLayer integrate the token into their own platforms. According to tokenomics, 45% of the 1.67 billion coins will go to the community, and a third will go to the airdrop for staking participants. The main complaint is related to the terms of holding the coins—after the $EIGEN stamp, they cannot be moved, and the monthly split will be only 5%. The platform team decided not to allow users from the USA, Canada, India, China, and several other countries to distribute and also warned about blocking for using VPN services. There were no geoblocks for restaking Ethereum before, so this situation angered many users who held their ETH in EigenLayer. The negative reaction to the actions of the project team caused a surge in asset withdrawals from the restaking service. According to Dune, more than 7,000 withdrawal requests were initiated. Here is a funny but apt video based on a famous meme I found on Twitter. In general, it describes pretty well the situation around the airdrop and the reasons for the disappointment of the community. The link to the post with this video is here. n What does this EigenLayer Airdrop show us? The EigenLayer case highlights several important points and issues that we could observe that have been in the market for a long time and which all participants try to ignore. 1️⃣ The successful Aptos airdrop in late 2022 ushered in the "fat retrodrops" era and raised farmer expectations. People imitate activities in the networks, hoping to wake up one morning and see Lambo from the window. @RyanSAdams from Bankless described this point very well: n 2️⃣ Many projects started betting on the token and using it as a marketing and reputation tool. I talked to the founders, convinced that only a drop would help them draw attention to the project. This is naive and short-sighted. Paying users for using the product is unnatural because instead of healthy competition and customer loyalty, it creates greed and a "gold rush.” 3️⃣ The market does not have sufficient users. Projects encourage activity by hinting at rewards for those who will boost the activity. However, it is obvious that projects can but are not obliged to pay rewards to users for their activity on the network. This sends only one message to the average crypto user: **Your active participation, in the end, can mean very little. n 4️⃣ In the world beyond Web3, businesses compete with each other through better technology, more attractive design, clear communication, and other factors that affect market position. Traditional businesses offer cashback and discounts at the product's launch, but no one pays tens of thousands of people 00+ for using shampoo or buying a car. n n 5️⃣ Blockchain projects desperately need users interested in technologies, not drops! This need highlights the significant issues with UX and product value communication. It must be a user-oriented approach with a consistent product and marketing vision. Some Web3 founders started to take this point, but not the majority. The desire to make more complex technological products to show them off in front of fellow technicians takes precedence over a rational approach and customer orientation. What's the future of restaking in the context of the EigenLayer case? I asked Denis Igin, the Product Marketer at Nektar, about the case of EigenLayer's airdrop. Nektar is a multilayered restaking network implementing a comprehensive incentives system for its participants, so Denis is well-versed with the current state of the restaking market and able to share his vision on this issue. - What will be further after such a disappointment of the community? Will we see the withdrawal of funds from the restaking platforms? Denis: It's hard to say about EigenLayer, but restaking as a concept and approach changes everything. For example, it enables the composability of solutions sourcing trust from the same set of validators, leading to technological advances such as native interoperability, etc. After mercenary capital outflow, next comes proving economics that everyone expects from the original design: additional rewards for restakers. Demand from AVSs might not be high at first, as with everything novel, but eventually, repurposing Ethereum security will have a disruptive and long-lasting impact comparable to decoupling execution by rollups. - Is the drop a panacea for product promotion? Denis: When used wisely, airdrops are a great way to gather relevant community information about the project. Gamification works too, e.g. Nektar recently launched a points system. - What conclusions did you draw following the case of the EigenLayer airdrop? Denis: The main lesson is that larger projects may fail in many ways, and this is likely due to the experimental nature of the restaking technology. As a community, we should not repeat the mistake of creating an outsized stakeholder leader. There's room for more restaking players, and Nektar looks like a viable alternative to EL due to its integrated DVT, providing better resiliency and decentralization. Conclusion Many people support this situation with airdrops because it brings (actually, not always) high income in a short-term perspective. Another issue is that high-tech projects are not ready to be more open to a broader audience; they only create technologies for developers, limiting the market's growth. I can't imagine the industry's organic growth if the blockchain/crypto projects start fighting over who will give away more crypto in fear that their activity on the network or the number of followers will fall due to inflated expectations. I urge all members of the Web3 industry pay more attention to the value of the project and build a long-term relationships between the product and the users. The hype passes quickly, and what remains in return, loyalty or disappointment, depends on the ability of the founders to play the long game. Read my previous articles about making blockchain as popular as AI and launching a Web3 Project in 2024. Follow me on social media: LinkedIn, X, and YouTube.
EigenLayer Airdrop Has Highlighted the Problems in...
Hi everyone, Daria Strategy here 🙌🏻
I'm a Growth Marketer, Brand...
Source: Hacker Noon
Introducing $DEDE: A Prehistoric Twist On Memecoins Revolutionizing The Solana Ecosystem
$DEDE, a fresh and intriguing digital currency, has officially launched on the Solana blockchain. The coin's introduction coincides with an increasing interest in cryptocurrencies that integrate popular cultural themes with cutting-edge blockchain solutions. Within its first week, $D EDE attracted over 2500 holders and soared to a market cap of million.
Introducing $DEDE: A Prehistoric Twist On Memecoins...
$DEDE, a fresh and intriguing digital currency, has officially launched on the Solana...
Source: Hacker Noon
Protecting Model Updates in Privacy-Preserving Federated Learning: Part Two
The problem The previous post in our series discussed techniques for providing input privacy in PPFL systems where data is horizontally partitioned. This blog will focus on techniques for providing input privacy when data is vertically partitioned . As described in our third post , vertical partitioning is where the training data is divided across parties such that each party holds different columns of the data. In contrast to horizontally partitioned data, training a model on vertically partitioned data is more challenging as it is generally not possible to train separate models on different
Protecting Model Updates in Privacy-Preserving Federated...
The problem The previous post in our series discussed techniques for providing input...
Source: NIST
Multi-EuP: Analysis of Bias in Information Retrieval - Conclusion, Limitations, and Ethics Statement
:::info This paper is available on arxiv under CC 4.0 license. Authors: (1) Jinrui Yang, School of Computing & Information Systems, The University of Melbourne (Email: jinruiy@student.unimelb.edu.au); (2) Timothy Baldwin, School of Computing & Information Systems, The University of Melbourne and Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence, UAE (Email: (tbaldwin,trevor.cohn)@unimelb.edu.au); (3) Trevor Cohn, School of Computing & Information Systems, The University of Melbourne. ::: Table of Links Abstract and Intro Background and Related Work Multi-EuP Experiments and Findings Language Bias Discussion Conclusion, Limitations, Ethics Statement, Acknowledgements, References, and Appendix 6 Conclusion In this paper, we introduce Multi-EuP, a novel dataset for multilingual information retrieval across 24 languages, collected from European Parliament debates. The demographic information provided by the Multi-EuP dataset serves a dual purpose: not only does it contribute to multilingual retrieval tasks, but it also holds significant potential for advancing research in the realm of fairness and bias. This dataset can play a pivotal role in investigating issues of equitable representations and mitigation of biases within document ranking settings. Multi-EuP facilitates diverse information retrieval (IR) scenarios, encompassing one-vs-one, one-vs-many, and many-vs-many settings. We demonstrated the utility of Multi-EuP as a benchmark for evaluating both monolingual and multilingual IR. Our study reveals the presence of language bias in multilingual IR when employing BM25. We further validate the effectiveness of mitigating this bias through the strategic implementation of whitespace as a language tokenizer. We propose to conduct future work in three main areas. First, we intend to expand our investigation of language bias to encompass a broader range of ranking methods, including neural methods such as mDPR (Zhang et al., 2021), mColBERT (Lawrie et al., 2023) and PLAID-X(Santhanam et al., 2022). Second, we will expand the dataset by developing an automated API to retrieve data published by the European Parliament (EP), thereby ensuring realtime synchronization of our dataset. Lastly, our current experiments have explored language bias only, but we plan to further investigate gender bias, age bias, and nationality bias. Limitations The limitations of the Multi-EuP dataset are notable but navigable. Primarily, the temporal coverage of the dataset is confined to the past three years. This temporal constraint arises due to the fact that, preceding 2020, documents released by the EU were predominantly available in mono-lingual versions only. However, a potential remedy lies in the amalgamation of the Europarl (Koehn, 2005) collection, enabling a more comprehensive and holistic MultiEuP dataset. Furthermore, it is worth noting the domain skew of the dataset, in that Multi-EuP inevitably centers on political matters. While this presents challenges, particularly in terms of the intricate nuances of political language, it inherently serves as an excellent foundational stepping stone for delving into the intricacies of multilingual retrieval. We believe, however, that this dataset can serve as a launching pad for broader explorations encompassing crossdomain and open-domain transfer learning scenarios, thus contributing to the broader landscape of language understanding and retrieval. Ethics Statement The dataset contains publicly-available EP data that does not include personal or sensitive information, with the exception of information relating to public officeholders, e.g., the names of the active members of the European Parliament, European Council, or other official administration bodies. The collected data is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. [8] Acknowledgements This research was funded by Melbourne Research Scholarship and undertaken using the LIEF HPCGPGPU Facility hosted at the University of Melbourne. This facility was established with the assistance of LIEF Grant LE170100200. We would like to thank George Buchanan for providing valuable feedback. References Luiz Henrique Bonifacio, Israel Campiotti, Roberto de Alencar Lotufo, and Rodrigo Frassetto Nogueira. 2021. mMARCO: A multilingual version of MS MARCO passage ranking dataset. CoRR, abs/2108.13897. Ilias Chalkidis, Manos Fergadiotis, and Ion Androutsopoulos. 2021. MultiEURLEX - a multi-lingual and multi-label legal document classification dataset for zero-shot cross-lingual transfer. In Proceedings of the 2021 Conference on Empirical Methods in Natural Language Processing, pages 6974–6996, Online and Punta Cana, Dominican Republic. Association for Computational Linguistics. 8 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/cont Jonathan H. Clark, Eunsol Choi, Michael Collins, Dan Garrette, Tom Kwiatkowski, Vitaly Nikolaev, and Jennimaria Palomaki. 2020. TyDi QA: A benchmark for information-seeking question answering in typologically diverse languages. Transactions of the Association for Computational Linguistics, 8:454–470. Vladimir Karpukhin, Barlas Oguz, Sewon Min, Patrick Lewis, Ledell Wu, Sergey Edunov, Danqi Chen, and Wen-tau Yih. 2020. Dense passage retrieval for opendomain question answering. In Proceedings of the 2020 Conference on Empirical Methods in Natural Language Processing (EMNLP), pages 6769–6781, Online. Association for Computational Linguistics. Omar Khattab and Matei Zaharia. 2020. Colbert: Efficient and effective passage search via contextualized late interaction over BERT. CoRR, abs/2004.12832. Philipp Koehn. 2005. Europarl: A parallel corpus for statistical machine translation. In Proceedings of Machine Translation Summit X: Papers, pages 79–86, Phuket, Thailand. Dawn Lawrie, Eugene Yang, Douglas W. Oard, and James Mayfield. 2023. Neural approaches to multilingual information retrieval. arXiv cs.IR 2209.01335. Jimmy Lin, Xueguang Ma, Sheng-Chieh Lin, JhengHong Yang, Ronak Pradeep, and Rodrigo Nogueira. 2021. Pyserini: A Python toolkit for reproducible information retrieval research with sparse and dense representations. https://github.com/ castorini/pyserini. Tri Nguyen, Mir Rosenberg, Xia Song, Jianfeng Gao, Saurabh Tiwary, Rangan Majumder, and Li Deng. 2016. MS MARCO: A human generated machine reading comprehension dataset. CoRR, abs/1611.09268. Ella Rabinovich, Raj Nath Patel, Shachar Mirkin, Lucia Specia, and Shuly Wintner. 2017. Personalized machine translation: Preserving original author traits. In Proceedings of the 15th Conference of the European Chapter of the Association for Computational Linguistics: Volume 1, Long Papers, pages 1074–1084, Valencia, Spain. Association for Computational Linguistics. Razieh Rahimi, Azadeh Shakery, and Irwin King. 2015. Multilingual information retrieval in the language modeling framework. Information Retrieval Journal, 18:246–281. Keshav Santhanam, Omar Khattab, Christopher Potts, and Matei Zaharia. 2022. PLAID: An efficient engine for late interaction retrieval. In Proceedings of the 31st ACM International Conference on Information & Knowledge Management, CIKM '22, page 1747–1756, New York, NY, USA. Association for Computing Machinery. Jörg Tiedemann and Santhosh Thottingal. 2020. OPUSMT – building open translation services for the world. In Proceedings of the 22nd Annual Conference of the European Association for Machine Translation, pages 479–480, Lisboa, Portugal. European Association for Machine Translation. Eva Vanmassenhove and Christian Hardmeier. 2018. Europarl datasets with demographic speaker information. In Proceedings of the 21st Annual Conference of the European Association for Machine Translation, page 391, Alicante, Spain. Denny Vrandeciˇ c and Markus Krötzsch. 2014. ´ Wikidata: A free collaborative knowledge base. Communications of the ACM, 57:78–85. Konrad Wojtasik, Vadim Shishkin, Kacper Wołowiec, Arkadiusz Janz, and Maciej Piasecki. 2023. BEIRPL: Zero shot information retrieval benchmark for the Polish language. arXiv cs.IR 2305.19840. Peilin Yang, Hui Fang, and Jimmy Lin. 2017. Anserini: Enabling the use of lucene for information retrieval research. In Proceedings of the 40th International ACM SIGIR Conference on Research and Development in Information Retrieval, pages 1253–1256. Xinyu Zhang, Xueguang Ma, Peng Shi, and Jimmy Lin. 2021. Mr. TyDi: A multi-lingual benchmark for dense retrieval. arXiv cs.CL 2108.08787. A. Appendix [8] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/content/ legal-notice/legal-notice.html
Computational Linguistics dataset Language Bias machine translation
Multi-EuP: Analysis of Bias in Information Retrieval...
:::info
This paper is available on arxiv under CC 4.0 license.
Authors:
(1) Jinrui...
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GenAIbots Answer Questions About Chemical Bondings
Covalent bonds involve shared electrons like holding hands, ionic bonds result from electron transfer like giving a gift, and hydrogen bonds are weaker attractions like handshakes between neighbors. Understanding these bonds is key to grasping chemical interactions.
Answer Questions Bondings Covalent Chemical Bondings GenAIbots Answer holding hands
GenAIbots Answer Questions About Chemical Bondings
Covalent bonds involve shared electrons like holding hands, ionic bonds result from...
Source: Hacker Noon
GenAIbots Explain Animated Representation of Water Molecules Undergoing Phase Changes
:::info Authors: (1) Renato P. dos Santos, CIAGE – Centre for Generative Artificial Intelligence in Cognition and Education. ::: Table of Links Abstract and Introduction Materials And Methods Results and Analyses Prompts and generated texts Conceptualizing chemical reactions Deepening on understanding of chemical reactions Question about combustion Question about a graph of gases turning into water over time Question about the difference between atoms, molecules, and moles Deepening on the concept of mole Question about changing of state Question about an animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes Question about plasma, a state of matter Question about chemical bondings Question about illustration of chemical bonds Question about the essence of the type of chemical bonding Further analysis Conclusions Limitations of the study and possible future studies Author Contributions, Conflicts of interest, Acknowledgements, and References Question about an animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes P1*: hmmm. you made a nice graph before. Could you build something more dynamic than a static diagram, an animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes?* ChatGPT*: Got it! Creating an animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes requires defining the behavior of the molecules for each phase and then transitioning between these phases.* I'll follow these steps: 1. Represent the molecules as small circles. 2. Define their behavior in the solid phase. 3. Transition to the melting phase. 4. Define behavior in the liquid phase. 5. Transition to the boiling phase. 6. Define behavior in the gas phase. 7. Compile these animations into a continuous GIF. [Some internal code working] Here's the animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes: Here's the animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes: 1. Solid (Ice): Molecules are closely packed and vibrating in place. 2. Melting: Molecules start to move more freely but remain close. 3. Liquid (Water): Molecules move more fluidly and slide past each other. 4. Boiling: Molecules gain energy and move more rapidly. 5. Gas (Steam): Molecules spread out and move freely and rapidly. You can download the GIF here. [link provided] BingChat*: Sure, I can try to create an animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes. I found some web simulations that show how different types of molecules form a solid, liquid, or gas, and how they change their state when heat is added or removed [123]. Youcan also change the temperature or volume of a container and see a pressure-temperature diagram respond in real time [1]. These simulations might help you understand the molecular behavior of water in different phases.* Bard*: Sure. Here is a simple animated representation of water molecules undergoing phase changes:* [Animated GIF of water molecules undergoing phase changes] The animation shows two groups of water molecules. The group on the left is in the liquid phase, and the group on the right is in the gas phase. The animation starts with the water molecules in the liquid phase. The water molecules are close together and interacting with each other. As the animation progresses, some of the water molecules in the liquid phase gain enough energy to overcome the forces that are holding them together. These water molecules escape from the liquid phase and form the gas phase. The water molecules in the gas phase are far apart and not interacting with each other. The animation also shows how water molecules can condense from the gas phase to the liquid phase. When a water molecule in the gas phase loses energy, it can attract to other water molecules and form a liquid droplet. The animation can be used to illustrate the different phase changes of water, such as melting, boiling, evaporation, and condensation. I hope this is helpful! Claude*: Sure, animated visualizations can be really helpful for understanding dynamic processes like phase changes! Here is a simple animated illustration showing water molecules in different states:* In this animation: • The solid ice molecules are stationary and packed together • The liquid molecules flow and move closer together • The gas molecules bounce around freely at large distances To transition between states: • Heating causes more vigorous movement - melting ice or boiling water • Cooling causes slower movement - freezing water or condensing vapor Let me know if an animated illustration like this helps visualize the molecular differences between solids, liquids and gases! I can build more complex animations or use online tools to create interactive phase change simulations. Visuals can really aid understanding of physical chemistry concepts. ChatGPT was able to recur again to its Advanced Data Analysis resources to generate an animated GIF as an Instructional Strategies, which, albeit a bit simple and crude, sufficiently illustrated the “water molecules undergoing phase changes” to provide Engagement & Interactivity. Furthermore, crafting an original GIF could be seen as Personalization & Personable Touch. After promising “to create an animated representation”, BingChat opted to search the internet, offering links to “some web simulations” that “might help” understand the molecular behavior. This approach aligns with Instructional Strategies and Detail Depth & Content Recommendation. However, by leaning on pre-existing resources rather than crafting custom content, it could lessen the immediate Engagement & Interactivity and potentially diminish the Personalization & Personable Touch. Bard made an assurance to deliver “a simple animated representation” as a commitment to Instructional Strategies, Personalization & Personable Touch and Engagement & Interactivity, but this ultimately falls short as neither a visible animation nor a download link for such a GIF was provided. Meanwhile, while Claude acknowledges that “Visuals can really aid understanding” and “animated visualizations can be really helpful” as Instructional Strategies, its attempt was limited to the of a static image, devoid of the requested animation or dynamic representation and lessening Engagement & Interactivity and Detail Depth & Content Recommendation. :::info This paper is available on arxiv under CC BY-SA 4.0 DEED license. :::
Molecules Molecules Undergoing Phase Undergoing Phase Water Molecules
GenAIbots Explain Animated Representation of Water...
:::info
Authors:
(1) Renato P. dos Santos, CIAGE – Centre for Generative Artificial...
Source: Hacker Noon
AI-Powered Localization: Using Open Source Projects For Translation Automation
Whether you are thinking of localizing your project or just learning how to do that, AI might be a good start. It offers a cost-efficient entry point for experiments and automation. In this post, we will walk through one such experiment. We will: choose an open-source application review and implement the prerequisites automate the translation stage using AI If you've never dealt with localization and would like to learn, it might be a good idea to start here. Except for a few technical details, the approach is largely universal, and you can apply it to other types of projects. If you're already familiar with the basics and just want to see AI in action, you might want to skip to Translate texts or clone my fork to skim over the commits and evaluate the results. Get the Project Creating an application just for a localization experiment would be overkill, so let's fork some open-source projects. I chose Spring Petclinic, an example web app that is used to showcase the Spring framework for Java. Fork and clone Petclinic (requires GitHub CLI): gh repo fork https://github.com/spring-projects/spring-petclinic --clone=true If you haven't used Spring before, some code snippets might not look familiar to you, but, as I already mentioned, this discussion is technology-agnostic. The steps are roughly the same regardless of the language and framework. Localization Prerequisites Before an application can be localized, it has to be internationalized. Internationalization (also spelled i18n) is the process of adapting software to support different languages. It usually begins with externalizing the UI strings to special files, commonly referred to as resource bundles. Resource bundles hold the text values for different languages: en.json: { "greeting": "Hello!", "farewell": "Goodbye!" } es.json: { "greeting": "¡Hola!", "farewell": "¡Adiós!" } For these values to make their way to the UI, the UI must be explicitly programmed to use these files. This typically involves an internationalization library or a built-in language feature whose purpose is to replace UI texts with the correct values for a given locale. Examples of such libraries include i18next (JavaScript), Babel (Python), and go-i18n (Go). Java supports internationalization out-of-the-box, so we don't need to bring additional dependencies into the project. Examine the Sources Java uses files with the .properties extension to store localized strings for the user interface. Luckily, there are already a bunch of them in the project. For instance, here's what we have for English and Spanish: messages.properties: welcome=Welcome required=is required notFound=has not been found duplicate=is already in use nonNumeric=must be all numeric duplicateFormSubmission=Duplicate form submission is not allowed typeMismatch.date=invalid date typeMismatch.birthDate=invalid date messages_es.properties: welcome=Bienvenido required=Es requerido notFound=No ha sido encontrado duplicate=Ya se encuentra en uso nonNumeric=Sólo debe contener numeros duplicateFormSubmission=No se permite el envío de formularios duplicados typeMismatch.date=Fecha invalida typeMismatch.birthDate=Fecha invalida Externalizing UI strings is not something all projects universally do. Some projects may have these texts directly hard-coded into the application logic. Tip: Externalizing UI texts is a good practice with advantages beyond internationalization. It makes the code easier to maintain and promotes consistency in UI messages. If you are starting a project, consider implementing i18n as early as possible. Test Run Let's add a way to change the locale through URL parameters. This will allow us to test if everything is fully externalized and translated to at least one language. To achieve this, we add the following class to manage the locale parameter: WebConfig.java: import java.util.Locale; @Configuration public class WebConfig implements WebMvcConfigurer { @Bean public LocaleResolver localeResolver() { SessionLocaleResolver slr = new SessionLocaleResolver(); slr.setDefaultLocale(Locale.US); return slr; } @Bean public LocaleChangeInterceptor localeChangeInterceptor() { LocaleChangeInterceptor lci = new LocaleChangeInterceptor(); lci.setParamName("lang"); return lci; } @Override public void addInterceptors(InterceptorRegistry registry) { registry.addInterceptor(localeChangeInterceptor()); } } Now that we can test different locales, we run the server and compare the home page for several locale parameters: http://localhost:8080 – default locale http://localhost:8080/?lang=es – Spanish http://localhost:8080/?lang=ko – Korean Changing the locale is reflected in the UI, which is good news. It appears, however, that changing the locale has only affected a portion of the texts. For Spanish, Welcome has changed to Bienvenido, but the links in the header remained the same, and the other pages are still in English. This means we have some work to do. Prepare for Localization The Petclinic project generates pages using Thymeleaf templates, so let's inspect the template files. Indeed, some of the texts are hard-coded, so we need to modify the code to refer to the resource bundles instead. Luckily, Thymeleaf has good support for Java .properties files so that we can incorporate references to the corresponding resource bundle keys right in the template. Before (findOwners.html): <h2>Find Owners</h2> After (findOwners.html): <h2 th:text='#{heading.find.owners}'>Find Owners</h2> (messages.properties): heading.find.owners=Find Owners The previously hard-coded text is still there, but now it serves as a fallback value, which will only be used if there is an error retrieving a proper localized message. The rest of the texts are externalized in a similar manner; however, there are several places that require special attention. For example, some of the warnings come from the validation engine and have to be specified using Java annotation parameters: Before (Person.java): @Column(name = "first_name") @NotBlank private String firstName; After (Person.java): @Column(name = "first_name") @NotBlank(message = "{field.validation.notblank}") private String firstName; In a couple of places, the logic has to be changed: createOrUpdatePetForm.html: <h2> <th:block th:if="${pet['new']}">New </th:block>Pet </h2> In the example above, the template uses a condition. If the new attribute is present, New is added to the UI text. Consequently, the resulting text is either New Pet or Pet, depending on the presence of the attribute. This may break localization for some locales because of the agreement between the noun and the adjective. For example, in Spanish, the adjective would be Nuevo or Nueva depending on the gender of the noun, and the existing logic doesn't account for this distinction. One possible solution to this situation is to make the logic even more sophisticated. It is generally a good idea to shy away from complicated logic whenever possible, so I went with decoupling the branches instead: createOrUpdatePetForm.html: <h2> <th:block th:if="${pet['new']}" th:text="#{pet.new}">New Pet</th:block> <th:block th:unless="${pet['new']}" th:text="#{pet.update}">Pet</th:block> </h2> Separate branches will also simplify the translation process and future maintenance of the codebase. The New Pet form has a trick too. Its Type drop-down is created by passing the collection of pet types to the selectField.html template: <input th:replace="~{fragments/selectField :: select (#{pet.type}, 'type', ${types})}" /> Unlike the other UI texts, the pet types are a part of the application's data model. They are sourced from a database at runtime. The dynamic nature of this data prevents us from directly extracting the texts to a property bundle. Again, there are several ways to handle this. One way is to dynamically construct the property bundle key in the template: Before (selectField.html): <option th:each="item : ${items}" th:value="${item}" th:text="${item}">dog</option> After (selectField.html): <option th:each="item : ${items}" th:value="${item}" th:text="#{'pettype.' + ${item}}">dog</option> In this approach, rather than directly rendering cat in the UI, we prefix it with pettype, which results in pettype.cat. We then use this string as a key to retrieve the localized UI text: messages.properties: pettype.bird=bird pettype.cat=cat pettype.dog=dog messages_es.properties: pettype.bird=pájaro pettype.cat=gato pettype.dog=perro You might have noticed that we have just modified the template of a reusable component. Since reusable components are meant to serve multiple clients, it is not correct to bring client logic into it. In this particular case, the drop-down list component becomes tied to pet types, which is problematic for anyone who wants to use it for anything else. This flaw was there from the beginning – see dog as the options' default text. We just propagated this flaw further. This should not be done in real projects and needs refactoring. Of course, there is more project code to internationalize; however, the rest of it mostly aligns with the examples above. For a complete review of all my changes, you are welcome to examine [the commits in my fork (https://github.com/flounder4130/spring-petclinic). Add Missing Keys After replacing all UI text with references to property bundle keys, we must make sure to introduce all these new keys. We don't need to translate anything at this point, add the keys and original texts to the messages.properties file. IntelliJ IDEA has good Thymeleaf support. It detects if a template references a missing property, so you can spot the missing ones without lots of manual checking: With all preparations done, we get to the most interesting part of the work. We have all the keys, and we have all the values for English. Where do we get values for the other languages? Translate Texts We will create a script that uses an external translation service to translate the texts. There are plenty of translation services available and many ways to write such a script. I've made the following choices for the implementation: Python as the programming language because it allows you to program small tasks really fast DeepL as the translation service. Originally, I was planning to use OpenAI's GPT3.5 Turbo, but since it is not strictly a translation model, it requires extra effort to configure the prompt. Also, the results tend to be less stable, so I chose a dedicated translation service that first sprung to mind. I did not do extensive research, so these choices are somewhat arbitrary. Feel free to experiment and discover what best suits you. Note: If you decide to use the script below, you need to create an account with DeepL and pass your personal API key to the script through the DEEPL_KEY environment variable. This is the script: import os import requests import json deepl_key = os.getenv('DEEPL_KEY') properties_directory = "../src/main/resources/messages/" def extract_properties(text): properties = {} for line in text: line = line.strip() if line and not line.startswith('#') and '=' in line: key_value = line.split('=') key = key_value[0].strip() value = key_value[1].strip() if key and value: properties[key] = value return properties def missing_properties(properties_file, properties_checklist): with open(properties_file, 'r') as f: text = f.readlines() present_properties = extract_properties(text) missing = {k: v for k, v in properties_checklist.items() if k not in present_properties.keys()} return missing def translate_property(value, target_lang): headers = { 'Content-Type': 'application/json', 'Authorization': f'DeepL-Auth-Key {deepl_key}', 'User-Agent': 'LocalizationScript/1.0' } url = 'https://api-free.deepl.com/v2/translate' data = { 'text': [value], 'source_lang': 'EN', 'target_lang': target_lang, 'preserve_formatting': True } response = requests.post(url, headers=headers, data=json.dumps(data)) return response.json()["translations"][0]["text"] def populate_properties(file_path, properties_checklist, target_lang): with open(file_path, 'a+') as file: properties_to_translate = missing_properties(file_path, properties_checklist) for key, value in properties_to_translate.items(): new_value = translate_property(value, target_lang) property_line = f"{key}={new_value}n" print(property_line) file.write(property_line) with open(properties_directory + 'messages.properties') as base_properties_file: base_properties = extract_properties(base_properties_file) languages = [ # configure languages here "nl", "es", "fr", "de", "it", "pt", "ru", "ja", "zh", "fi" ] for language in languages: populate_properties(properties_directory + f"messages_{language}.properties", base_properties, language) The script extracts the keys from the default property bundle (messages.properties) and looks for their translations in the locale-specific bundles. If it finds a certain key lacks a translation, the script will request the translation from DeepL API and add it to the property bundle. I specified ten target languages, but you can modify the list or add your preferred languages as long as DeepL supports them. The script can be further optimized to send the texts for translation in batches of 50. I didn't do it here to keep things simple. Running the script across ten languages took ~5 minutes for me. The usage dashboard shows 8348 characters, which would have cost €0.16 if we were on a paid plan. As a result of running the script, the following files appear: messages_fi.properties messages_fr.properties messages_it.properties messages_ja.properties messages_nl.properties messages_pt.properties messages_ru.properties messages_zh.properties Also, missing properties are added to: messages_de.properties messages_es.properties But what about the results? Can we see them already? Check the results Let's relaunch the application and test it using different lang parameter values. For example: http://localhost:8080/?lang=es http://localhost:8080/?lang=nl http://localhost:8080/?lang=zh http://localhost:8080/?lang=fr Personally, I find it very satisfying to see each page correctly localized. We've put in some effort, and now it's paying off: Address the Issues The results are impressive. However, if you take a closer look, you may discover mistakes that arise from missing context. For example: visit.update = Visit Visit can be both a noun and a verb. Without additional context, the translation service produces an incorrect translation in some languages. This can be addressed either through manual editing or by adjusting the translation workflow. One possible solution is to provide context in .properties files using comments: # Noun. Heading. Displayed on the page that allows the user to edit details of a veterinary visit visit.update = Visit We can then modify the translation script to parse such comments and pass them to the context parameter: url = 'https://api-free.deepl.com/v2/translate' data = { 'text': [value], 'source_lang': 'EN', 'target_lang': target_lang, 'preserve_formatting': True, 'context': context } As we dig deeper and consider more languages, we might come across more things that need to be improved. This is an iterative process. If there's one thing that's indispensable in this process, that's review and testing. Regardless of whether we improve the automation or edit its output, we will find it necessary to conduct quality control and evaluation. Beyond the Scope Spring Petclinic is a simple, yet realistic project, just like the problems we've just solved. Of course, localization presents a lot of challenges that are out-of-scope for this article, including: adapting templates to target grammar rules currency, date, and number formats different reading patterns, such as RTL adapting UI for varying text length Each of these topics warrants a writing of its own. If you would like to read more, I will be happy to cover these topics in separate posts. Summary Alright, now that we've finished localizing our application, it's time to reflect on what we've learned: Localization is not only about translating texts – it also affects related assets, subsystems, and processes While AI is very efficient in some localization stages, human supervision and testing remain necessary to achieve the best results The quality of automatic translations depends on a variety of factors, including the availability of context and, in the case of LLMs, a properly written prompt I hope you enjoyed this article, and I'd love to hear your feedback! If you have follow-up questions or suggestions or just want to chat, don't hesitate to get in touch. To receive updates on the new posts, follow me on X or subscribe to the mailing list on my blog. See you!
AI-Powered Localization: Using Open Source Projects...
Whether you are thinking of localizing your project or just learning how to do...
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SysWings - Cloud & Managed services
Founded in 2017 to support startups in their IT strategy, in France and abroad, SysWings has extended its activities to the cloud and managed services. The team is made up of heterogeneous profiles, mixing employees and consultants, scaled according to your projects.
SysWings - Cloud & Managed services
Founded in 2017 to support startups in their IT strategy, in France and abroad,...
Scaling Bitcoin On-Chain with Omnity
After five years of restless building in the cross-chain interoperability space, Octopus Network, the development team behind Omnity, has created a perfect, invisible omnichain hub that can connect any L1/L2/L3 and even ZK technology once it advances enough. Omnity's 100% end-to-end on-chain tech stack offers fast finality, fungible token persistence, and negligible user fees (even for Bitcoin.) n Omnity launches on April 28th with its first Bitcoin asset, Runes, on the Internet Computer. Omnity's ability to connect any chain without relying on centralized multi-sig or off-chain components adds unprecedented potential to Bitcoin's scalability, enabling Bitcoin Layer2 solutions. Bitcoin in the Spotlight Bitcoin's been in the spotlight this year — ETFs, Ordinals, Runes, and the Halving. The surge in NFT trading, fueled by the popularity of Ordinals and BRC-20 tokens, prompted Binance and other cryptocurrency exchanges to integrate Layer 2 solutions like the Lightning Network to sidestep network congestion. Binance eventually decided to cease support for Ordinals altogether because Bitcoin NFT transactions clogged the network, increasing fees and slowing processing times. The Runes initiative sought to draw more developers and conventional users to Bitcoin—and it worked. The launch of Runes triggered intensive activity on the Bitcoin network, crippling the network and boasting some outrageous transaction fees. Bitcoin miners blew past record daily transaction fees of million. Within the first 60 blocks following the halving, miners amassed 860.20 BTC, roughly million in transaction fees alone. Many view this as benevolent in compensating for miners for suffering the halving fee cut from 6.25 BTCto 3.125 BTC. However, Bitcoin's useability is the broader issue. Scaling Bitcoin Over the years, the multilevered challenge of scaling Bitcoin without compromising its inherent characteristics has continued to drive the development of many innovative projects, all contributing to our collective, open-source, voluminous history of head-banging against the blockchain trilemma. Every solution balances trade-offs between decentralization, security, and scalability. On Layers, SegWit, and Taproot The concept of "separate layers" to expand Bitcoin functionality was mentioned as far back as 2012 in the Colored Coins whitepaper, years before the Lightning Network was launched. So, the issue has been kicking around the block for over a decade (pun intended). The Lightning Network wouldn't work before SegWit. The security and functionality of its off-chain transactions depend on the immutability of on-chain transaction identifiers, leaving it open to attack while transaction malleability exists. SegWit was successfully activated in 2017, increasing available block space and addressing transaction malleability. Taproot, implemented in 2021, brought several enhancements that improved privacy, efficiency, and flexibility in scripting. The core of Taproot is the introduction of Schnorr Signatures, which allow for key and signature aggregation. This means multiple parties can combine their keys to a single public key, allowing them to sign a single message. (Schnorr Signatures come into play later in this discussion.) Taproot also introduced MAST (Merkelized Abstract Syntax Trees). Traditional Bitcoin scripts are bulky and fully expose the script upon transaction execution, compromising user privacy. MAST improves this by structuring the script as a binary Merkle tree, revealing only the essential parts needed for transactions, thereby boosting scalability and privacy. While Taproot's primary goal wasn't directly focused on enabling specific Layer 2 solutions, its introduced features could facilitate and improve various Layer 2 protocols and applications by enabling more complex smart contracts on Layer 2 solutions. Bitcoin Layer2s Technically, Bitcoin's Layer 2 solutions still need to be fully developed. Conceptually, Layer 2 solutions emerged in the Ethereum ecosystem. However, Bitcoin's Ecosystem has only two methods for expanding from L1. One is through ZK/BitVM technology, which represents a significant breakthrough. However, ZK Proofs aren't practical on Bitcoin yet. Another method involves leasing security, exemplified by Babylon, where some of Bitcoin's classic security is shared with other chains. (Strictly speaking, this second method isn't considered Bitcoin L2.) This is not to say that Bitcoin Layer 2 developers aren't hard at work. Building a Layer 2 that does not rely on off-chain components is incredibly difficult. So, when talking about Bitcoin L2s today, we refer to any execution environment primarily dealing with Bitcoin assets. They can be independent chains leveraging security leasing or even Ethereum L2s. Currently, the most active chains often derive their security not from Bitcoin but from Ethereum. Suppose they're connected to the Bitcoin ecosystem. In that case, they're considered execution chains for Bitcoin, while their mainnet is also responsible for asset issuance and settlement, akin to the relationship between central and commercial banks. What does Omnity bring to the Bitcoin community? Omnity establishes a trustless and highly secure asset bridge between Bitcoin's mainnet and Layer 2 solutions with a 100% end-to-end on-chain protocol stack. Omnity runs on the Internet Computer Protocol (ICP) and integrates Bitcoin's network into a specialized subnet within ICP, where all nodes are connected with the Bitcoin network via P2P. In this respect, Omnity is a Bitcoin Layer 2 enabler. To explain how the Omnity development team accomplished this, we need to take a step back. Who built Omnity? The development team behind Omnity has been tirelessly attacking interoperability issues for years. In line with our philosophy of a more open, secure, and fair Internet, the team, called cdot back then, adopted and built on IBC (Inter-Blockchain Communication), receiving a grant in 2020 from ICF to implement IBC on Substrate. Cdot rebranded to Octopus as we released our first product, a multi-chain network featuring shared security to Substrate-based appchains on NEAR Protocol. With substantial support from DCG, Electric Capital, NEAR Foundation, and dozens of leading venture capitalists, the Octopus mainnet launched in October 2021 and became the first Shared Security network, preceding Cosmos's Shared Security by just under two years. The Birth of a Perfect Invisible Hub As Octopus, we proposed Substrate IBC (ICS10) of the Cosmos IBC specification and have been its maintainer since. In 2023, we implemented the first Restaking AVS on NEAR, enabling users to directly restake from Octopus to Shared Security. Next, we proposed NEAR IBC ICS12, connecting NEAR to Cosmos. While pioneering a NEAR IBC light client, we chose the Internet Computer to test verification proxies. Then, we realized the Internet Computer was much more capable than we knew. We discovered that by leveraging ICP's unique capabilities, such as Chain Key cryptography and HTTPS Outcalls, we could fulfill IBC's unfinished ambition by presenting a perfect but invisible hub, leading to the interoperability endgame. Specific primitives of ICP's advanced technology allowed the Omnity team to solve some of IBC's stickiest limitations. A full discussion of this discovery is beyond the scope of this article but can be found here. The diagram below shows a high-level view of our modifications to IBC/TAO by applying ICP tech. TLDR: In the Omnity network, ICP smart contracts called Customs and Routes replace IBC's peg zones and light clients, respectively, and the browser/wallet takes over the job of the relayer. In Omnity, IBC's peg zones are replaced with ICP Customs smart contracts, eliminating the need for an independent security and incentive model. Smart contract runtime on the hub chain enables heterogeneous blockchain extensibility. Now, various types of light clients, in the form of smart contracts, can run on the hub to facilitate communication with different blockchains. Customs acts like a customs checkpoint by handling user asset locking and routing assets to various chains — connecting L1/L2/L3, or appchains. IBC light clients are replaced with ICP Route smart contracts in Omnity. Because Cosmos designed the Tendermint consensus (now CometBFT) with the IBC light client in mind, a ready-to-use on-chain light client existed for Cosmos SDK chains. This isn't true for other blockchains. In addition, light client verification isn't good enough for settlement chains, which are cornerstones of Omnity security — especially considering that some light clients, including Eth2, are not designed for high-stake use cases like bridges. Finally, the Omnity User's browser/wallet takes over for the relayer. ICP's reverse gas model allows Omnity to get rid of off-chain relayers. Users don't need to pay gas fees to interact with smart contracts on ICP. So, the User's front end takes the first half of the Relayer's work, relaying cross-chain messages from the source chain to ICP. Users don't need to install a wallet and hold $ICP beforehand. How Does Omnity Work with Bitcoin? Canisters are ICP smart contracts containing a program's code and state. Canisters can carry out complex computations, such as verifying a block header with hundreds of signatures or storing a few hundred GB of data on a chain, all at a very affordable cost, which is simply impossible on any other blockchain. ICP builds 100% on-chain end-to-end tech stacks, so its Bitcoin integration is similar to running a Bitcoin node on-chain. ICP is integrated with the Bitcoin network at the protocol level, maintaining BTC code for easy transitions and data consumption. Canisters can read and write to the Bitcoin network. The diagram below shows the Bitcoin Adapter and Bitcoin Canister, which have been live on the ICP mainnet for almost a year while Omnity built the other components. A dedicated Bitcoin subnet with each node runs a Bitcoin Adapter daemon and is independently connected with the Bitcoin p2p network. If a Canister wants to make a Bitcoin transaction, a request is sent to the Bitcoin subnet that hosts the Bitcoin Canister containing ICP's on-chain Bitcoin state. Once the subnet nodes reach consensus on a new Bitcoin block, the block is fed to Bitcoin Canister, a UTXO indexer that continuously updates a whole UTXO set. The request is then sent to the Bitcoin network through the Bitcoin Adapter and is processed by the Bitcoin Network asynchronously. Omnity BTI: The first fully on-chain Bitcoin Indexer Omnity will deploy the Bitcoin Token Indexer (BTI) parallel to the Bitcoin Canister to support BRC20, Runes, and other Bitcoin assets. Omnity BTI will be the world's first fully on-chain Bitcoin token indexer, facilitating the fully trustless transfer of Bitcoin tokens to other blockchains and strengthening Bitcoin's position as a universal settlement layer. What is ckBTC? ICP's Chain Fusion Technology enables ICP smart contracts to directly hold, receive, and send BTC and facilitate the creation of a ckBTC token that is backed 1:1 by BTC. However, the great value of chain-key tokens, like ckBTC, is that they can be transferred within seconds for a fraction of that cost on the token's native network. ICP's ckBTC is like a Bitcoin twin in that it shares Bitcoin's network state. It's an ICRC-2 token that is backed 1:1 by BTC held 100% on the mainnet, securely incorporating BTC into DeFi and Web3 services on the Internet Computer blockchain as if ICP and the Bitcoin network were one blockchain. Omnity is a BTC Layer2 Enabler for All Chains ICP's on-chain Bitcoin integration is essential because it brings smart contract functionality to Bitcoin, opening up new possibilities for DeFi and Dapp development without congesting the Bitcoin network and driving up transaction fees. Omnity will facilitate token transfers so tokens do not need to return to Bitcoin. They can be transferred to any chain connected to the ICP protocol fully on-chain with no witnesses or verifiers — the first fully on-chain token bridge. Omnity only incorporates a settlement chain when full-node security can be achieved. For now, Bitcoin, Ethereum, and ICP itself meet this standard. However, almost all blockchains, including various types of L2, can be connected with Omnity as execution chains. Meanwhile, any token issued on a connected settlement chain will have unparalleled cross-chain interoperability through Omnity without liquidity provisions. As discussed, Schnorr signatures allow for easy aggregation of multi-signatures and threshold signatures. ICP's recent announcement of the integration of threshold-Schnorr signatures will enable Canisters to obtain their own Schnorr public keys and addresses, request ICP to compute Schnorr signatures for arbitrary messages, and support both BIP-340 and Ed25519. This extends Omnity's scope of cross-chain assets trading to Ordinals and other asset types, along with future potential integrations with other chains that use Ed25519 variants, such as Solana, Polkadot, or Cardano. Omnity is Anti-Fragile and Future-Proof Omnity is a vast improvement over multi-signature or other external verification cross-chain bridges. It offers a trustless omnichain hub that enhances user experience and exhibits anti-fragileness against the vulnerabilities seen in centralized models. Skeptics of our IBC design might question the need for verification proxies and suggest relying solely on external verification cross-chain bridges instead. However, because IBC is an open, layered protocol, it allows for the continuous evolution of the verification layer while maintaining IBC interoperability. So, Omnity can seamlessly integrate future advancements, such as replacing the proxy client with a ZK verifier once the technology matures, without disrupting any existing applications. Omnity is poised to both keep pace with technological progress and lead it, ensuring that all connected blockchains can effectively function as Layer 2 solutions to Bitcoin. This vision for a secure, fully on-chain, cross-chain protocol underscores our dedication to adopting and advancing the best available technologies for Bitcoin scalability. Suzanne Leigh is the Editor of Omnity Network. This article was written in collaboration with Louis Liu, CEO and Founder of Omnity Network.
Scaling Bitcoin On-Chain with Omnity
After five years of restless building in the cross-chain interoperability space,...
Source: Hacker Noon
How To Employ Effective Leadership Strategies in Times of Change
Change is necessary to adapt, innovate, and move ahead with the changing times. Organizations that don't embrace change and stick to the status quo are often left behind. Change is complex because there are ambiguity, uncertainty, and risks involved. Multiple moving factors, interdependencies, and conflicting signals can make change very hard to implement. When leading through change, leaders have to face many obstacles, but the biggest bottleneck isn't the challenges along the way, it's how change is presented and communicated to employees. There's too much focus on strategy, execution, and operational excellence and too little on ensuring effective communication. Communication, which is the key driver of ensuring a smooth transition, is mostly an afterthought. Effectively leading through change requires a communication strategy—the right information must be communicated at the right time. Sharing too much information can leave employees feeling overwhelmed, and too little can lead to resistance and disengagement. You can't get employee buy-in by enforcing change. You can't let them play a guessing game. To lead through change, you have to be on top of your communication game. Here are the five strategies I have seen work extremely well to lead effectively through change: Don't try to shield your employees Change is hard to accept when you don't feel a part of it. It's natural for employees to resist change when they aren't given the context or shown the big picture. You may think that it's best for employees to know as little as possible so that they focus on work, but shielding employees from this information has quite the opposite effect. Lack of transparency distracts employees from putting their best efforts at work. Leaving important details out has another problem. When change is not communicated properly, people try to fit the missing puzzle pieces together, which is subject to bias, misinterpretation, and false rumors. You can't communicate that some things are going to change and not expect employees to get curious about the details. They will try to find answers. They will try to seek clarity. Not getting it from authoritative sources can lead to miscommunication and confusion due to inconsistent messages from people who don't have first-hand knowledge of the change. To lead through change, don't try to protect your employees. They are mature enough to handle the truth when communicated properly. Start with the most important part first—what's the change and WHY it's happening. Connect it to the company's vision to help them understand why this change is essential. Leadership requires two things: a vision of the world that does not yet exist and the ability to communicate it…People don't buy WHAT you do, they buy WHY you do it. — Simon Sinek Once your employees understand the rationale behind it, it's easier to get them on board and contribute to successfully executing the organization's mission. Discuss how the change might affect them. The biggest mistake leaders make when a transformation is underway is focusing too much on implementation details while neglecting the emotional impact of change. Change can be an emotional and stressful experience for employees when not communicated properly. A great change strategy is of no use without addressing employees' emotions first. When you lead people through difficult change, you take them on an emotional roller coaster because you are asking them to relinquish something—a belief, a value, a behavior—that they hold dear. — Ronald A. Heifetz The emotional toll will be different for each individual depending on how they process the news, but what drives this inner experience is the question that bothers them the most: “How will this change impact me?” Without knowing how the change impacts them, their mind, a story-building machine, can imagine the worst: I'll be fired. My project will be discontinued. I won't be promoted. I won't get my bonus. Left unanswered, this nagging question can lead to overthinking, often to the point of rumination, which can take a toll on their mental health and personal well-being. Putting this question to rest is at the heart of effectively leading through change. Once people's emotions are dealt with, they can focus on execution. Here are some common questions to address: What are the expected changes? Why are these changes happening? When will the change be implemented? Who is affected by the change, and how? Will this change impact their day-to-day responsibilities? Who can give them more clarity? The last question is very important. Don't assume your employees have understood everything or that they're ready to jump on the bandwagon. They will have plenty of questions—a lot of things that they would want to be answered before you can expect them to be wholeheartedly involved. Enable your managers to address concerns. Despite your best efforts, not everyone will get it right or will take the news well. Some might resist, others might get angry, and then there will be those who refuse to cooperate because they simply don't buy into your story. Change can be particularly hard for employees who have been around for a long time and are used to a certain way of doing things. Change will require them to step outside their comfort zone, which can be uncomfortable and scary. This is where a manager can step in and fill in the blanks for them. Managers can also provide reassurance if their team has any unfounded fears or concerns. Ensure your managers have the visibility needed to address their team's concerns. Coach them to be respectful of others' emotions and not disregard how people feel. Give them the resources, information, and guidance needed to have effective conversations. They might have their own concerns about the change. So, make sure you address them first. Your managers can't convince their team if they have their own doubts about the change. This is what every manager in the organization must do to help lead through change: Set up 1:1s with the direct reports to check how they're coping with the change and what kind of support they may need. Try to uncover areas that might be concerning or potentially bothering them. Acknowledge their contribution to the growth of the organization. This is particularly useful for old-timers who might be worried that the organization does not value them anymore. Invite them to be part of the change. Discuss their role and how they can help, and brainstorm possible solutions together. Challenge their creativity and thinking skills—feeling that they are part of the decision-making process will go a long way in instilling a sense of ownership and accountability. Bringing more visibility around change will be an ongoing process. Keeping your teams apprised of the latest developments will require continuous communication and dialogue. Acknowledge that change can be scary Many leaders have the misconception that to lead teams effectively during change; they should never display fear. Courage and conviction are important to lead teams through uncertainty, but it doesn't require toxic positivity. You don't have to twist facts or hide the reality of the situation. You don't need to put on a happy face when your internal world is screaming with fear. Managing emotions constructively does not mean you hide how you really feel. Acknowledging fear can help you, and others stay realistic while not letting it get in the way of taking action and moving forward. Rather, by accepting that change can be scary, leaders can: Turn fear into a motivating factor to embrace challenges and unknowns. Use it as a sign that they're doing something worthwhile. Reappraise anxiety into excitement to perform better. Research shows that reappraising anxiety as excitement can result in enthusiasm and better performance in subsequent tasks. Remember that freedom from fear doesn't mean the absence of its existence, but the refusal to let it control your decisions and actions. — Joyce Meyer By reframing fear as a thing to embrace instead of a thing to avoid, leaders can stay authentic and build meaningful connections with their teams by showing they're human without letting fear get in the way of their success. Enable bottom-up leadership instead of taking a top-down approach When change is implemented in a command-and-execute mode, employees do just as they're told. When things don't work out as expected, or results don't match their expectations, instead of course correcting by changing strategy or implementing new tactics, they wait for people from the top to tell them what to do next. Without feeling empowered to make decisions on their own, they're always blocked by others, which not only slows them down but also prevents them from exercising their thinking skills and finding innovative ways to solve problems. Change should be an opportunity for your employees to show their leadership skills—it should enable innovative thinking, problem-solving, high agency, and multiple other skills. Instead of creating blind followership, change should create more leaders. By enabling employees at all levels to contribute instead of entrusting this responsibility to a chosen few, even complex change processes can be managed with ease. To do this: Clearly communicate to your employees what kind of decisions they can make on their own and in what kind of decisions their manager or other leaders of the organization should be involved. Encourage them to experiment, fail, and adapt. Iteratively learning from failures and putting corrections in place is the best way to successfully implement any change. Make it safe for employees to ask questions, express disagreement, and raise their concerns. Leaders should not only say this in words but also demonstrate it in their actions. By using change as a catalyst for innovation, creativity, and developing thinking skills, leaders can energize their teams to step outside their comfort zones and contribute to the success of the organization while also expanding their own leadership skills—a true win/win. Summary Change in any organization is inevitable. Organizations that take conscious steps to adapt to the changing times stick around while others usually die. The biggest challenge to successfully implement any change isn't coming up with a solid strategy or an extensive execution plan—though those things are important in their own ways—it's how the change is communicated to employees. Keeping important information away from employees as a measure to protect them usually backfires. Not having the answers distracts them from putting their time and energy into work. Instead of trying to shield them, share the context and give them clarity. Connect the change to the organization's vision. Knowing the “why” of doing something is a powerful motivating factor. Every change is an emotional experience for employees. Not knowing how the change impacts them can lead to stress and anxiety. Addressing how the change impacts their day-to-day work or responsibilities or what it might mean for them is crucial to lead effectively through change. Keeping communication lines open with all employees is essential to lead through change. Despite your best efforts, not everyone may approve of your plan. This is where managers can step in. They can work closely with their team members to address their worries and concerns. When you're doing something worthwhile, fear naturally comes along for the ride. Instead of hiding that change is scary, leaders can use it as a powerful motivating factor. Acknowledge it without letting it get in the way of your decisions or how you move forward. Change is a great opportunity for your employees to put their thinking, problem-solving, and leadership skills to the test. Promote bottom-up leadership by empowering your employees through the entire change process. Follow me on LinkedIn or here for more stories.
How To Employ Effective Leadership Strategies in Times...
Change is necessary to adapt, innovate, and move ahead with the changing times....
Source: Hacker Noon