<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?><rss xmlns:dc="http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/" xmlns:content="http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/" xmlns:atom="http://www.w3.org/2005/Atom" version="2.0" xmlns:media="http://search.yahoo.com/mrss/"><channel><title><![CDATA[Victor Garcia Mata]]></title><description><![CDATA[Ideas in motion ]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/</link><image><url>https://www.vicmata.com/favicon.png</url><title>Victor Garcia Mata</title><link>https://www.vicmata.com/</link></image><generator>Ghost 4.48</generator><lastBuildDate>Thu, 04 Jun 2026 18:23:17 GMT</lastBuildDate><atom:link href="https://www.vicmata.com/rss/" rel="self" type="application/rss+xml"/><ttl>60</ttl><item><title><![CDATA[Life Update Q4 2021]]></title><link>https://www.vicmata.com/life-update-q4-2021/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">6168ea54e84242033460615b</guid><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 15 Oct 2021 03:26:06 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1495571758719-6ec1e876d6ae?crop=entropy&amp;cs=tinysrgb&amp;fit=max&amp;fm=jpg&amp;ixid=MnwxMTc3M3wwfDF8c2VhcmNofDE1fHxTb2xpdHVkZXxlbnwwfHx8fDE2MzQyNjc5Nzg&amp;ixlib=rb-1.2.1&amp;q=80&amp;w=2000" medium="image"/><content:encoded/></item><item><title><![CDATA[A Quantum future]]></title><description><![CDATA[Quantum computing is not a replacement for classical computers, is only superior on a certain type of operations]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/a-quantum-future/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">60ee8678e8424203346060bc</guid><category><![CDATA[Technology]]></category><category><![CDATA[Quantum Computing]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 14 Jul 2021 07:03:48 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1578801503688-d30fffee6a9e?crop=entropy&amp;cs=tinysrgb&amp;fit=max&amp;fm=jpg&amp;ixid=MnwxMTc3M3wwfDF8c2VhcmNofDJ8fFF1YW50dW18ZW58MHx8fHwxNjI2MjQ1NzIy&amp;ixlib=rb-1.2.1&amp;q=80&amp;w=2000" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<h2 id="the-end-of-moore%E2%80%99s-law">The end of Moore&#x2019;s Law</h2><img src="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1578801503688-d30fffee6a9e?crop=entropy&amp;cs=tinysrgb&amp;fit=max&amp;fm=jpg&amp;ixid=MnwxMTc3M3wwfDF8c2VhcmNofDJ8fFF1YW50dW18ZW58MHx8fHwxNjI2MjQ1NzIy&amp;ixlib=rb-1.2.1&amp;q=80&amp;w=2000" alt="A Quantum future"><p>Gordon Moore&#x2019;s predicted in 1965 that the number of components inside a chip would double every year, in 1975 when he reviewed the numbers they were correct, and thus was born the Moore&#x2019;s Law, which has been used for many years to measure the progress of technology over time.</p><p>Today&#x2019;s computers have nearly 50 billion transistors but this exponential Journey is coming to an end. In 2019 Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang declared &quot;Moore&apos;s Law isn&apos;t possible anymore.&quot;, the high cost of Research and Development to find new ways to reduce the size of transistors combined with the complicated and expensive manufacturing processes are some of the reasons why the technological advancements have been slowing down since the year 2000.</p><p>Computers have become more powerful and smaller every year by increasing the number of transistors they can fit inside microprocessors, today we can produce circuits with 7nm (Samsung and TSMC) but this process gets harder every year, we are approaching the limitations imposed by Physics, we are reaching dimensions where electrons no longer follow the laws of Classic Physics but instead the ones of the Quantum Physics.</p><p>The current pressure to keep pushing the limits of computation is making large companies take new approaches to solve these problems. AI, Computer Vision, Self-driving cars are just some examples of advancements we have had in the past 50 years, all of them require immense computing power, to make progress in those fields, we have to innovate at the microprocessor level.</p><h2 id="general-purpose-vs-specific-purpose">General-purpose vs specific purpose</h2><p>One approach to help work around these limitations is to develop special-purpose processors, designed to perform better under specific circumstances such as Crypto mining or computer vision applications, doing this could extend the life of Moore&#x2019;s law but only for so long. </p><p>One clear example of specialization is the existence of the GPU (Graphics processing Unit) a type of processor specifically designed to process graphics better than a more generic CPU.</p><h2 id="a-new-type-of-computation">A new type of computation</h2><p>During the past few years or months it is very likely that you have heard the word &#x201C;<strong>Quantum computing</strong>&#x201D; or &#x201C;<strong>Quantum supremacy</strong>&#x201D; around the internet, but what does it mean?</p><h2 id="a-brief-history-of-quantum-computing">A brief history of Quantum computing</h2><p>In the 1980s the Famous Physicist Richard Feynman was researching the Quantum world, due to the complexity of Quantum calculations he came up with the idea of running a simulation instead. During his simulations, he notices that the current computer could not scale to the magnitude required to perform the Quantum calculations during a reasonable time.</p><p>Feynman proposed that to solve problems of the Quantum world we would need to build a computer that operates under the same rules, and thus surge the idea of Quantum computing.</p><h2 id="what-is-quantum-computing">What is Quantum computing?</h2><p>Quantum computing is like regular computing, the difference is in the way the calculations are made. Classical computers perform operations using <strong>Bits</strong>, which can contain a value of 0 <strong>or</strong> 1 <strong>at any given tim</strong>e, Quantum computers use something called <strong>Qbits </strong>which can contain any value between 0 <strong>and</strong> 1 <strong>at the same time</strong>.</p><p>A good analogy to explain this is using coins, if you toss a coin into the air and when it falls it will have a value of <em>Face</em> or <em>Back </em>(0 or 1) that is a <strong>Bit</strong>. If Instead of tossing the coin into the air you make it <em>spin</em>, it doesn&#x2019;t have a value of 0 or 1, it has both while it is spinning, something like 30% face and 70% back, a range of values between 0 and 1 would be valid for a <strong>Qbit</strong>. Another way to put it is that Bit stores digital values while Qbits store analogical values.</p><h2 id="qbits">Qbits</h2><p>One of the benefits of Qbits over Bits is that they can store all the possible values they can represent at the same time. For example</p><p>If you have 10 <em>Classical bits</em>, you can represent the numbers from 0 to 1024, but those 10 bits can only store one value at a time.</p><p>10 Classical bits can store the value of:<br>0000000000 <strong>or </strong>0000000001 <strong>or </strong>0000000010 [...] at any given time.</p><p>Qbits on the other hand can also represent the values from 0 to 1024, and any value in between at the same time, which means that 10 Qbits can store 1024 values, and each value can be any number that you can store with 10 Classical bits.</p><p>10 Qbits can contain the values of:<br>[<br>0000000000,<br>0000000001,<br>0000000010,<br>{...}<br>]</p><p>At the same time! All the possible values you can represent with 10 classical bits (1024), this phenomenon is called <strong>Superposition</strong>.</p><p>The formula for this is 2^<strong>n</strong>, where <strong>n</strong> is the number of Qbits.</p><p>It means you can store 1024 different values with just 10 Qbits, and to store the same amount of information on a regular computer you would need 1024 Bits.</p><p><strong>This exponential difference in storage capacity can speed up certain types of operations that require a large number of steps</strong>, such as searching for a person&#x2019;s name on a 1 Million directory, with a classical computer it could 1 Million steps to find that person&#x2019;s name in the worst case, with a Quantum computer it would take the Square Root of 1 Million steps to find it.</p><p>The speed increase of quantum computers does not come from the speed of each operation, which might be even slower than on a regular computer due to its complexity, the increase in speed comes from the reduced amount of total operations required to achieve the same result.</p><p>Quantum computing is not a replacement for classical computers, is only superior on a certain type of operations, Anything that a Quantum computer can do can be done with a classical computer given enough time and resources.</p><h2 id="entanglement">Entanglement</h2><p>Another phenomenon used by Quantum computers is called Entanglement, which happens when 2 Qbits are close to each other they relate to one another, this means the value of one Qbit is mathematically related to the value of the other one. For example, using the analogy of the Coin</p><p>If the Qbit one has the value of 1, by the phenomenon of <em>entanglement </em>we can guarantee that the value of the Qbit two will always be 0, when the Qbit one has the value of 1 and vice versa.</p><h2 id="from-theory-to-reality">From Theory to reality</h2><p>Currently, many companies are racing to develop more powerful Quantum computers and to achieve something called Quantum supremacy, which is a point in history where you can solve a problem faster than on any other known classical computer.</p><p>Quantum computers are also highly energy-efficient, now days most of the energy required to keep them working comes from the cooling systems, since these Quantum properties are only observable when certain materials (Depending on how the Qbits are built) reach temperatures close to 0 Kelvin, the Absolute Zero when all subatomic movements stop.</p><p>Some of the biggest names on the field right now are IBM, Intel, IonQ, NVIDIA, and Honeywell which have fully functional and commercially available Quantum computers, some are even available through cloud services such as Google Cloud or AWS Bracket.</p><p>This field is still in its infancy and some people estimate that for Quantum computers to be commercially useful we would need to build computers with over 1 thousand Qbits, as of today most companies offer services with less than 100 Qbits, there is a long way ahead of us, but maybe this technology will open new frontiers for computer science and new computing capabilities beyond Moree&apos;s law.</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[A search for meaning]]></title><description><![CDATA[<p>As with every self-discovery journey mine started with the ancient question of &quot;<em>What is the meaning of life?</em>&quot; a question I avoided for so long by staying busy, chasing shadows, doing what everyone else did. &quot;<em>Don&apos;t worry too much, it all will come clear someday&</em></p>]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/a-search-for-meaning/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">60869b118fa813ab92679d1d</guid><category><![CDATA[Meditations]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Mon, 26 Apr 2021 11:05:37 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1521193698642-9810ddf4bff6?crop=entropy&amp;cs=tinysrgb&amp;fit=max&amp;fm=jpg&amp;ixid=MnwxMTc3M3wwfDF8c2VhcmNofDM2fHxzYWlsfGVufDB8fHx8MTYxOTQzNDMxMA&amp;ixlib=rb-1.2.1&amp;q=80&amp;w=2000" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1521193698642-9810ddf4bff6?crop=entropy&amp;cs=tinysrgb&amp;fit=max&amp;fm=jpg&amp;ixid=MnwxMTc3M3wwfDF8c2VhcmNofDM2fHxzYWlsfGVufDB8fHx8MTYxOTQzNDMxMA&amp;ixlib=rb-1.2.1&amp;q=80&amp;w=2000" alt="A search for meaning"><p>As with every self-discovery journey mine started with the ancient question of &quot;<em>What is the meaning of life?</em>&quot; a question I avoided for so long by staying busy, chasing shadows, doing what everyone else did. &quot;<em>Don&apos;t worry too much, it all will come clear someday&quot;</em> I told myself over and over, but that was a lie, <strong>answers must be sought</strong>.</p><p>And so my Journey began and I stumbled upon a series of possible answers that I collected from people around me and self-help texts across the internet.</p><h2 id="to-enjoy">To enjoy</h2><p>The Hedonistic way, for those who turn life itself into a 24/7 party. Even though Happiness comes in many ways and there is nothing wrong with enjoyment and pleasure this is the worst path someone could take as the meaning of life.</p><p>Devoting one&apos;s life to maximizing pleasure and enjoyment will lead to a life of excess and procrastination, If pleasure is all life has to offer drugs and alcohol must be the ultimate expression of life itself.</p><h2 id="to-experience">To experience</h2><p>experiencing all or most that life has to offer seems attractive, but I think that is something that can be achieved as we live, a result of the act of living not the goal, and if we make this the entire goal of our lives we run into the same problem as with hedonism.</p><h2 id="to-dedicate-life-to-a-causeideal">To dedicate life to a cause/ideal</h2><p>Finding meaning in helping others is a very noble way and I deeply respect whoever chooses it. I am not selfless enough to make this the sole purpose of my life but I do agree we should try to make the life of those around us better, and I will do my best.</p><p>Devoting life to your career or your kids is also another way to see it, the problem with that is that when things go bad that is your entire life, and we know that on this world things can always go bad.</p><hr><p>In the middle of my midnight meditations about life and its mysteries, I wondered &quot;<em>What if life doesn&apos;t have an absolute meaning to be uncovered?</em>&quot; If there is such thing someone would have found it a long time ago and all would agree to it in the same way as we agree with Math or Physics (mostly).</p><h2 id="to-create-meaning">To create meaning</h2><p>Through my Journey I realized that Meaning is something that can be created, humans have the power to give meaning to things.</p><p>Humans have the power to bring something to this universe that wasn&apos;t here when it was created.</p><p>Rocks don&apos;t have a meaning until a sculptor transforms them into something that has it, pigments have no meaning until a painter arranges them in a way that has it.</p><h2 id="is-constructed-meaning-real">Is constructed meaning real?</h2><p>As real as what makes tears roll through your cheeks, feelings and emotions are real and matter, therefore the meaning we construct must be just as real.</p><p>I told myself, that must be it!, <strong>the entire purpose of life must be to create, to build things that have meaning. The creation of meaning is a cure against the entropy of the universe.</strong></p><p>That was until one day I realized that <strong>just because we can do something we have no obligation to do so</strong>,<strong> that the meaning of life is not a reason to live.</strong> I have the power to create something unique, to enrich this universe with my meaning, and inspire others to do the same but why?</p><p>I believe I found my answer but I will share my findings in my next post.</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Self reflection on my personal growth]]></title><link>https://www.vicmata.com/self-reflection-on-my-personal-growth/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">6072ac7ea6b6179627e0d992</guid><category><![CDATA[Divagations]]></category><category><![CDATA[Personal]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 11 Apr 2021 10:11:29 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1504609811860-89f68587a2b6?crop=entropy&amp;cs=tinysrgb&amp;fit=max&amp;fm=jpg&amp;ixid=MnwxMTc3M3wwfDF8c2VhcmNofDI0fHxtaXJyb3J8ZW58MHx8fHwxNjE4MTM1Njk4&amp;ixlib=rb-1.2.1&amp;q=80&amp;w=2000" medium="image"/><content:encoded/></item><item><title><![CDATA[The hunter and the deer - Story]]></title><description><![CDATA[<p>Heavy were the steps of the white deer across the forest, loud and strong they smashed the ground on every move while it ran away for its life without losing its grace, jumping and dodging among the ancient trees it resembled a ghost with it&#x2019;s white snow pelt.</p>]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/the-hunter-and-the-deer/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">60715ed2a6b6179627e0d8b4</guid><category><![CDATA[Short Story]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sat, 10 Apr 2021 09:17:32 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/deer.jpg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/deer.jpg" alt="The hunter and the deer - Story"><p>Heavy were the steps of the white deer across the forest, loud and strong they smashed the ground on every move while it ran away for its life without losing its grace, jumping and dodging among the ancient trees it resembled a ghost with it&#x2019;s white snow pelt. Non stop it ran away in the depth, when it finally felt safe next to a river it stopped to drink and catch it&#x2019;s breath.</p><p>The wind was still that day and the deer worried for they were friends, had the deer upset it&#x2019;s friend in any way? Why would he not speak now?</p><p>		&#x201C;My friend, are you here? <em>Wind</em> I need you, someone is following me, please hide my trails, erase them from the earth and lead me somewhere safe&#x201D; Said the Deer, not with words, but with a sacred language that only few can speak &#x201C;Where are you my friend?&#x201D;</p><p>The wind remained silent because he wasn&#x2019;t there, perhaps he was talking to a new friend on distant lands, the wind is a free and friendly spirit after all, but you can&#x2019;t call it to your side on command, it comes and goes as it pleases, such is the nature of the wind, friend of everyone but loyal to none.</p><p>With no answer from it&#x2019;s friend, the deer approached the river to drink anyway, the thirst was strong and it&#x2019;s legs were weary. So it drank and there was peace on it&#x2019;s heart.</p><p>The sound of water clashing against the river stones, yellow light leaking trough the forest ceiling. A whistle and a crack sounded in the distance followed by a deep and burning pain on the deer&#x2019;s chest. An arrow sunk on it&#x2019;s skin now tainted red. The wind had abandoned the deer that day but not it&#x2019;s luck, the arrow did not reach its heart this time, he fled once again into the heart of the black forest with tears on it&apos;s eyes.</p><p>From the woods emerged a young man with bow on hand and Carcaj on it&#x2019;s back. He looked around but the deer wasn&#x2019;t dead lying on the ground, instead he found just blood and it&#x2019;s broken arrow. He bent over to inspect the scene.</p><p>		&#x201C;This doesn&#x2019;t make sense, I shot my arrow and I heard it hit! There is blood right here and my arrow split, why? Why is my arrow split in half and where is the deer?!&#x201D;, He cried out loud</p><p>		&#x201C;Another Hunter hit your prey first!&#x201D;, Yelled a voice from the above &#x201C;A more skilled one, his arrow hit yours in mid air, that&#x2019;s why your arrow lies on the ground, and that&#x2019;s why there is no prey here for you.&#x201D;</p><p>The hunter looked above to locate the voice, a Crow spoke to the man, watching from a branch.</p><p>		With a smile on it&#x2019;s face the man said &#x201C;There you are my friend! You said another hunter got my prey?&#x201D; his face turned red &#x201C;Those pesky knights on their shimmering armor! It must have been one of them, looking for another trophy to hang on their fireplace, are they not pleased with what they have already?&#x201D; said as he threw his broken arrow into the river.</p><p>		&quot;Ha! All men are the same indeed, you all think a deer belongs to you just because you saw it first, but no! The deer belongs to itself. You hunt just as they do, and whichever arrow lands is up to the deer and the hunter, each hoping the other will make a mistake.&quot; After saying that, the crow flew down to the man and landed on the arm of it&#x2019;s friend.</p><p>		&quot;We all might hunt, but the reasons are different, they hunt whatever they can get and I only hunt this particular deer&quot; Said as he &#xA0;raised its arm to the height of its face and stared at Huginn&apos;s eyes. </p><p>		&#x201C;The act is the same, but If it serves as consolation friend, it was you who stole the prey of the knight for it was your arrow well placed that slowed down his and prevented it from reaching its heart. Let&#x2019;s track the deer and get your prey, now that the other hunter gave up after he saw the deer running away from him, he turned around looking for an easier target.&#x201D; And so Huginn flew from the arm of it&#x2019;s friend and into the Sky</p><p>		&#x201C;Lead the way, as reward you can have whichever part you like&#x201D; Said the hunter &#x201C;But we must catch it before it bleeds out&#x201D;</p><p>And so they traveled through the wilderness, following the trace of the wounded deer. After a while they reached a place where the track ended, the entrance of an abandoned place.</p><p>		Perplexed, the hunter asked &#x201C;What is that?&#x201D; staring at the doorway</p><p>In Front of him were thick walls made of solid stone that extended from east to west endlessly, at the entrance tall columns holding an arch, the two columns were masterfully carved with the shape of people holding the arch on top of their heads with their hands.</p><p>		Huginn flew and stood on top of the head of one of the sculptures and said &#x201C;This is an old forgotten place, it was built by the old ones as a gift for your people, but your kind is weak Hunter, everyone ran away from this place as soon as it appeared. None bothered to look inside for fear of what they might find.&#x201D;</p><p>		Looking at Huginn and in a very serious tone the Hunter asked &#x201C;Are there monsters inside?&#x201D; like a child asking it&apos;s mom</p><p>		&#x201C;No silly! The monsters live in the cities of men where there is plenty of food, here there is only dust and lost things. Like that deer you want, the poor thing ran away inside to hide from you.&#x201D; said Huginn as he stared into his friend.</p><p>		&#x201C;Then there is nothing to be afraid of&#x201D;, Said with relief</p><p>		&#x201C;Of course not&#x201D; Said Huginn as he flew from his high ground and into the Hunter&#x2019;s shoulder &#x201C;but just in case you go first&#x201D;</p><p>They both laughed</p><p>		&#x201C;Don&#x2019;t worry, a wounded deer can only go so far before passing out&#x201D; Said the hunter as he put his bow on his other shoulder.</p><p>With that said, they crossed the doorway and ventured into that forgotten place.</p><hr><p>And with that concludes this part of a story I have had in my head for a while, hope you liked it, let me know in the comments what you think of it, this is mostly an intro or it could be the end, who knows, tell me if you want to know more about this fantastic world I made.</p><p>Formatting doesn&apos;t look great right now, need to do some changes on the CSS to make my short stories easier on the eye.</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[To be seen]]></title><link>https://www.vicmata.com/to-be-seen/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">606db7aba6b6179627e0d805</guid><category><![CDATA[Divagations]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 07 Apr 2021 14:09:50 GMT</pubDate><content:encoded/></item><item><title><![CDATA[Embracing hard times as a crucible for growth]]></title><description><![CDATA[A life crisis, the lost of a loved one or a broken heart are just a few examples of situations that can leave a deep scar in our souls, But can we use this setbacks in our life to propel ourselves into a better place?]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/hard-times-as-a-crucible-for-growth/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">606056aa5071749a93e7371a</guid><category><![CDATA[Meditations]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 07 Apr 2021 06:46:02 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/kintsugi.jpg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/kintsugi.jpg" alt="Embracing hard times as a crucible for growth"><p>Reflecting upon my own life I noticed that the biggest jumps in personal growth and changes of perspective happened after I overcame a hard time and I started to consider the idea that maybe all the pain in our life can be worth it, if we can endure and use it in our favor of course. </p><h2 id="life-is-suffering-movement-and-change">Life is suffering, movement and change</h2><p>Since the beginning of time humans have struggled with life itself, and we built tools and ideals to live by, but regardless of what topic we study few truths remain constant: <strong>Life hurts, if you don&apos;t evolve you die and you have to keep moving</strong>. Easier said than done, but stay with me, I&apos;ll try to prove it&apos;s all worth it.</p><blockquote>But how? how can this pain I feel be good in any way? when every breath I take feels like a knife trough my heart</blockquote><p>First we must acknowledge that we are broken, that we have been torn to pieces by the situation we are going trough and we need to do something. This is actually good, <strong>It&apos;s hard to see it when you are drowning in emotions but being broken means we can take the pieces and put them back together in a new way.</strong> Most of us go trough life every day without questioning why we do the things we do, or what do we want in our lifes, It&apos;s easier to stay bussy than to stop for a moment and reflect about our lifes and there is no better time for reflection than this.</p><blockquote>When we are broken we open ourselves to new ideas, new perspectives and we ask the right questions.</blockquote><p>There is a Japanese art called <em>Kintsugi</em> which consists on reparing broken pottery using gold or other precious metals, making the pieces unique and more beautiful than they were before. We should see ourselves as the broken pottery, not <em>&quot;without repair&quot;</em> but as a piece of art in progress. </p><p>Don&apos;t deny your feelings, don&apos;t try to escape from them or they will come back stronger in the future. You might be tempted to try to put yourself back together as you were before, to regain the life you had, that is impossible, and if you try to do it you will just waste all the pain you went trough. Process what you are going trough and re invent yourself, you will see life with new eyes and a new you will emerge from the ashes if you can turn this adversity into an oportunity. <strong>Look at you as what you are, a piece of art, because when you overcome your difficulties I guarantee you that you will be more beautiful than you currently are.</strong></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Between the devil and the deep blue sea]]></title><link>https://www.vicmata.com/reaching-out/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">606863bd5071749a93e73a30</guid><category><![CDATA[Divagations]]></category><category><![CDATA[Personal]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 06 Apr 2021 02:37:00 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/scylla.jpeg" medium="image"/><content:encoded/></item><item><title><![CDATA[Cities of last things - Movie Review]]></title><description><![CDATA[The story of a broken man going on a downward spiral. This movie starts at the lowest point in the life of Zhang Dong-ling an individual full of resentment that has decided to finally tie some lose ends on what we can barely call his life.]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/cities-of-last-things-movie-review/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">6066b2585071749a93e738bf</guid><category><![CDATA[Movie Review]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Fri, 02 Apr 2021 07:29:09 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/Screenshot-from-2021-04-02-00-13-56.jpg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/Screenshot-from-2021-04-02-00-13-56.jpg" alt="Cities of last things - Movie Review"><p>The story of a broken man going on a downward spiral. This movie starts at the lowest point in the life of Zhang Dong-ling an individual full of resentment that has decided to finally tie some lose ends on what we can barely call his life.</p><p><strong>Did I liked the movie?</strong> <em>No, Yes and Yes</em></p><p><strong>Overall score:</strong><em><strong> </strong>6/10</em></p><p><strong>From now on, there might be some spoilers on this post, if you don&apos;t care or if you have seen the movie you can keep reading. </strong></p><p>This movies is divided on 3 main &quot;Acts&quot; or short stories, the same main character across the most important events of his life.</p><p>The first story we are presented with is a futuristic dystopia, one single night that is the culmination of a life full of resentment and regrets. This is my least favorite part, the character lacks depth to it&apos;s personality, mostly because the way this movie was built but mainly because this story is set in stone, there is no growth, we can only what what Zhang Dong-ling does and we don&apos;t really know why and he doesn&apos;t seem to care much either. The first episode could have been more meaningful if it were presented at the end of the movie but it would have been a very boring ending. The writer decided to put the worst part first and then move on.</p><p>The second story happens when the career of Zhang Dong-ling is just starting, full of hope and driven by what seems to be a strong moral code until things go south for him. Here he dies, or at least he wished he did.</p><p>The third and last episode is when he is just 17, things are hard and he needs money but at the bottom is still just a kid. Here he finds something he thought lost for so long just to lose it again.</p><p>The second and third story are the strongest ones, you can feel the focus in on the main character and his personal journey. The first episode feels rushed, and even after watching all the other two still feels like it&apos;s acting for no reason. He is cold and executed his plan carefully without hesitation, yet he is dominated by his rage a few times, which doesn&apos;t match at all.</p><p>If only we could delete the first 30 minutes of this movie, this would have been a very good movie.</p><p>The way the story is told reminded me of <a href="https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1371111/">Cloud Atlas,</a> but on smaller scale.</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Existential dread for breakfast]]></title><description><![CDATA[<p>The water for my coffee is almost ready, just as I will be to start another day. I Pour the steaming water on my french press and mix the coffee beans at the Rhythm of <em>The</em> C<em>lash</em>, but as I mix the water to that crazy <em>Casbah</em> sound, my</p>]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/existential-dread-for-breakfast/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">606547c85071749a93e7372c</guid><category><![CDATA[Divagations]]></category><category><![CDATA[Personal]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Thu, 01 Apr 2021 06:06:45 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/pexels-nao-triponez-129207_light.jpg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/04/pexels-nao-triponez-129207_light.jpg" alt="Existential dread for breakfast"><p>The water for my coffee is almost ready, just as I will be to start another day. I Pour the steaming water on my french press and mix the coffee beans at the Rhythm of <em>The</em> C<em>lash</em>, but as I mix the water to that crazy <em>Casbah</em> sound, my mind drifts away.</p><p>If not here, where am I? searching for answers to the questions that keep haunting me. I search for the meaning of life and search for my own purpose, not a purpose or a meaning given to me by some cosmic being or the current society I live on. If not a universal truth my hope Is that I will find my own way some day.</p><p>But damn, this is such a struggle, it&apos;s a battle not against <em>my demons</em> but against something I call <em>the void</em>. The awareness that my existence is so insignificant compared to the immensity of time and the feeling of being alone on this battle for none else seems to be aware of how insignificant we are. When I ask for answers to others I often get short replies that feel more like a copy-paste of something than an actual opinion, there is very few people in this world that I can talk about this kind of topics and I am very grateful for having them on my life, wouldn&apos;t change you for all the money in the world.</p><p>I seek purpose and meaning because I have the strange feeling that my life will be shorter than usual, maybe is just in my head but being fully conscious of how brief and fragile life is I want to live it to the fullest. Becoming who I am meant to be is part of the process, a human driven not by the expectations of others but by my own. </p><p>This search for meaning comes with a cost, the void with it&apos;s shapeless form is always lurking at every corner of my mind, reminding me of how small we are and trying to convince me to give up on my quest, but giving up is giving up on life. There is no guarantee that I will find what I am looking for, but if I ever do I hope I&apos;ll be free. Until then I&apos;ll do what I can, resist the void, try to be true and try to be a light in the darkness for those who are lost like me.</p><p>My coffee is ready, and a voice pulls me out of this philosophical wrestling, it&apos;s a tie. Now my day has begun, so much to do I better hurry.</p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[Communities, what are they and how are they built?]]></title><description><![CDATA[<p>Community this, Community that, What is a community anyway? </p><p>And more importantly, what do I need to build one?</p><p><strong>What is a community?</strong></p><p>From a geographical point of view, a community is a group of people that live in the same place or have a characteristic in common, like identity,</p>]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/communities-what-are-they-and-how-are-they-built/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">605d734f5071749a93e732be</guid><category><![CDATA[Community]]></category><category><![CDATA[Society]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sun, 28 Mar 2021 03:47:36 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/03/pexels-matheus-bertelli-2608517_2.jpg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/03/pexels-matheus-bertelli-2608517_2.jpg" alt="Communities, what are they and how are they built?"><p>Community this, Community that, What is a community anyway? </p><p>And more importantly, what do I need to build one?</p><p><strong>What is a community?</strong></p><p>From a geographical point of view, a community is a group of people that live in the same place or have a characteristic in common, like identity, religion, educational background or race.</p><p>From the point of view of a social interaction, a community is a group of people, who may or may not live in close proximity, who interact socially.</p><p><strong>What is social interaction?</strong></p><p>Any interaction between two or more people. That&apos;s why we say that someone is &quot;Socially isolated&quot; it means they are not interacting with other people.</p><p><strong>What is Interaction?</strong></p><p>From Physics and in simple words, the way in which something affects something else.</p><blockquote>For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. - Isaac Newton, 3rd law of motion</blockquote><p>Put in a social context, the way people affect or influence each other.</p><p>With those concepts out of the way, lets jump straight into the juicy stuff. </p><p><strong>Can social interaction be Digital?</strong></p><p><strong>Yes</strong>, it has been proven by the so well known <em>Social networks</em> like Facebook or Twitter, which in their name tell us they seek to encourage the interaction between two or more individuals. </p><p>Because of that, we can say that any &quot;Social network&quot; or &quot;Social media&quot; content that doesn&apos;t drive interaction is not serving it&apos;s purpose. </p><p>Going back to the concept of interaction, we said it happens when two individuals affect each other, and produce a <strong>reaction</strong>. </p><p>As an example, Facebook went from &quot;likes&quot; to &quot;Reactions&quot;, in an attempt to better emulate this behavior on a digital world. With the press of a button I can affect what another person sees on it&apos;s device (Action and reaction).</p><h2 id="how-do-we-build-a-community">How do we build a community?</h2><p>Following those definition we can come up with a very simple recipe, get two people or more together and make them interact with each other, Boom! #Profit. You are welcome, thanks for reading, see you next time...no.</p><p>We know the basic ingredients of this recipe, now let&apos;s cook.</p><p><strong>What keeps a community together?</strong></p><ul><li>A sense of belonging, could be in the form of a membership or by the feeling of support and acceptance of other members of the community.</li><li>Integration and influence, Members participate actively in ways which can affect the entire community such as engaging in discussions about topics that the community considers important or by participating on activities organized by other members.</li><li>A Shared emotional connection/experience<br><em>ex, going to the same concert/gathering, watching the same movie or reading the same book </em></li></ul><p>The more of these components we can integrate into our community, the stronger it will become. </p><p>Put special attention to provide at least the following when building your community:</p><p><strong>A place for reunion</strong></p><p>People need to gather somewhere, having a place where they can hangout is the most basic requirement for building a community. It can be your backyard or a digital space like Discord or Twitch. </p><p>If you can provide a schedule and frequency for the &quot;gathering&quot; even better, by doing that you increase the chances of having the same people participating more than once and creates the opportunity for them to interact with each other.</p><p><strong>An identity</strong></p><p>Name your community, make a symbol if necessary, people want to belong to something and feel special for that, having a name and an identity will help you to provide that.</p><p><strong>Activities</strong></p><p>Provide activities or ways in which the members can participate, these should be planned based on the type of community you are involved and the medium (Digital or in person).</p><p>Having group activities is also very important because by participating on these activities people will have shared memories, and shared memories gives people a topic to talk about in the future, generating more interactions.</p><h2 id="conclusion">Conclusion</h2><p>With this we covered the concept of what is a community and the most basic requirements to build your own. There are differnet things you can build your community around, like a specific interest or a person, but that will be a topic for another day.</p><p>Hope you find article useful, now you can go and build a strong community or improve an existing one.</p><p> <em>Photo by <a href="https://www.pexels.com/@bertellifotografia?utm_content=attributionCopyText&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=pexels">Matheus Bertelli</a></em></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[My struggle #1]]></title><link>https://www.vicmata.com/my-struggle-1/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">605e97b35071749a93e7357d</guid><category><![CDATA[Personal]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Sat, 27 Mar 2021 02:50:51 GMT</pubDate><content:encoded/></item><item><title><![CDATA[The schools of the future]]></title><description><![CDATA[<p>In the old days If you wanted to become a good artist you had to train under the direct supervision of a master on that field at that time.</p><p>Then we created schools, and the lessons were given to a whole group instead of one individual at a time. This</p>]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/the-schools-of-the-future/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">605abfac5071749a93e72f63</guid><category><![CDATA[Technology]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Wed, 24 Mar 2021 07:26:01 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/03/pexels-polina-zimmerman-3747505-1-.jpg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/03/pexels-polina-zimmerman-3747505-1-.jpg" alt="The schools of the future"><p>In the old days If you wanted to become a good artist you had to train under the direct supervision of a master on that field at that time.</p><p>Then we created schools, and the lessons were given to a whole group instead of one individual at a time. This increased the amount of highly educated people on a society and as a result the quality of life eventually.</p><p>During the industrial revolution we got the print, which made the distribution of books and knowledge more accessible to everyone. I would say this was the holy grail of education at the time. The ability to reproduce the intellectual works and ideas at a scale never seen before.</p><p>Technology has evolved non stop since then, to the point where now we can distribute any content like text, pictures, video or audio to every corner of the world in the time it takes us to press one button. The ideas fly over internet and they are even hard to stop, mutating and evolving at a very fast rate.</p><p>And our schools... they haven&apos;t changed much since then. Sure, we have computers now, email and zoom, we can even attend a class from the comfort of our home no matter where we live.</p><p>But the way we teach classes hasn&apos;t changed much, we just transferred the offline experience of a school to the digital world.</p><p><strong>Why does it need to change? </strong></p><p>Public or even private schools teach in a way that was conceived at another time. Go to a physical location, every day, for a specific duration of time and absorb whatever the teacher has to teach you.</p><p><strong>And what about the content we teach at schools?</strong></p><p>The programs are usually designed to ensure that all the students who complete their education program have at least the minimum of what it takes to do their job, or whatever the education program is.</p><p>And how do they do that? By creating a program that is moderately challenging to perhaps 70-80% of the population. It means that for the rest is either too easy or highly challenging.</p><p>We all are equal as humans, but as individuals we are so different from each other, with different skills and potential for different things. By providing education in the current way we are deliberately wasting the potential of those who fall outside of the norm.</p><p>People who struggle at school could do better if we teach them in a way they can understand or discover their unique skills at which they can be remarkable. Gifted students won&apos;t just exceed the expectations of the programs, they can even go beyond the program and learn something many levels above it&apos;s peers.</p><h3 id="how-can-we-leverage-technology-to-scale-education">How can we leverage technology to scale education?</h3><p>Instead of just replicating what we have been doing for thousands of years let&apos;s re think how we can do it.</p><p><strong>Did you ever had a favorite teacher at school?</strong></p><p>It probably means there was something about that teacher that just clicked with the way you are as a person. We should focus on hiring and training great teachers but also try to match them with the students that can benefit the most from them.</p><p><strong>How can we match teachers and students?</strong></p><p>Perhaps if we collect data of similar students and the classes they took we can start to make suggestions of teachers they might like. Similar to the way music apps recommend you new artists to listen or Facebook people you might know, but on this case, teachers to learn from.</p><p>Or maybe we can take the &quot;Dating site&quot; approach, and try to match students with teachers based on their own terms.Maybe both, why not? </p><p><strong>Scaling the teachers</strong></p><p>This concept isn&apos;t new, the concept of <strong>MOOC</strong>,s <em>(Massive Open Online Courses)</em> has been around for a while, but currently is not leverage by traditional institutions on their day to day classes.</p><p>Perhaps there is a stigma about remote learning, but thankfully that stigma seems to be fading away now that during COVID many people switched to 100% Remote learning.</p><p>On a traditional school you have your classes with one teacher and you attend to them certain days at a certain hour. But on a digital world there shouldn&apos;t be such constrain anymore!</p><p>We can keep that same model, but also record each class, and make it available to every student, even if they are not part of the same class you are in.</p><p>Why? because maybe your assigned teacher is great, but you had trouble understanding today&apos;s topic, you can just go to the online platform, find the same class you just took and re-watch the video, or watch the video about the same topic explained by another teacher.</p><p>You don&apos;t have to be limited to just one teacher at a time anymore.</p><p><strong>Students can&apos;t focus on online platforms</strong></p><p>That only means <strong>the content is not interesting enough</strong>. We should invest on making the content of the program more engaging instead of just dumping information as it is on the books to the students and ask them to pay attention.</p><p>If we are going to do that, we might as well just give them a PDF Version of the entire course material and ask them to complete the final exams whenever they are ready.</p><p>People claim they don&apos;t read, yet they spend hours and hours reading articles on Facebook or Twitter, so reading or using an online platform is not the problem, is the content.</p><p>There is so much we can learn from the Social networks, they have optimized user engagement over the past years to the point where you can just keep reading post after post, and you won&apos;t even realize how long have been there.</p><p>If we can leverage that for education purposes, that would be the holy grail of education of this century.</p><p><strong>Is in person learning dead?</strong></p><p>No, there is nothing like being face to face with people, I have that clear now. I am not proposing to get rid of it, I propose to enhance it. </p><p>Technology should empower people, and I think this is a great opportunity because the gap is huge and the technology is already here.</p><hr><p>Sites with MOOC where you can learn anything for free:</p><ul><li><a href="https://www.edx.org/">EDX</a></li><li><a href="https://www.coursera.org/">Coursera</a></li><li><a href="https://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm"><a href="https://ocw.mit.edu/index.htm">MI</a>T Open coursware</a></li></ul><p>Tools that can be used for online classes</p><ul><li><a href="https://open.edx.org/">OpenEDX</a> (Open source)</li><li><a href="https://moodle.org/">Moodle</a> (Open source)</li><li><a href="https://edu.google.com/intl/en/products/classroom/">Google classrom</a></li><li><a href="https://www.blackboard.com/">Blackboard</a></li><li><a href="https://new.edmodo.com/">Edmodo</a></li></ul><p>Photo by <strong><a href="https://www.pexels.com/@polina-zimmerman?utm_content=attributionCopyText&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=pexels">Polina Zimmerman</a></strong> from <strong><a href="https://www.pexels.com/photo/books-on-brown-wooden-shelf-3747505/?utm_content=attributionCopyText&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_source=pexels">Pexels</a></strong></p>]]></content:encoded></item><item><title><![CDATA[And it all began with an explosion]]></title><description><![CDATA[<p><em>In one instant, where there was only darkness and cold now was filled with light and heat.</em></p><p>This is my first post on this tinny space I&apos;ll call home for a while, recently I have been inspired to start writing myself by reading the <a href="https://jsmnk.co/">blog</a> of a friend,</p>]]></description><link>https://www.vicmata.com/the-begining/</link><guid isPermaLink="false">6059a6215071749a93e72ecc</guid><category><![CDATA[Divagations]]></category><dc:creator><![CDATA[Victor Garcia]]></dc:creator><pubDate>Tue, 23 Mar 2021 08:58:01 GMT</pubDate><media:content url="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/03/pexels-resized.jpeg" medium="image"/><content:encoded><![CDATA[<img src="https://www.vicmata.com/content/images/2021/03/pexels-resized.jpeg" alt="And it all began with an explosion"><p><em>In one instant, where there was only darkness and cold now was filled with light and heat.</em></p><p>This is my first post on this tinny space I&apos;ll call home for a while, recently I have been inspired to start writing myself by reading the <a href="https://jsmnk.co/">blog</a> of a friend, I told my self <em>&quot;I&apos;ll give it a shot, why not?&quot;</em></p><p><strong>But for how long?</strong></p><p>I really don&apos;t know, but will try it at least for one year.</p><p><strong>What am I going to write about?</strong></p><p>Whatever my heart desires, I have been looking for a place on the internet where I can share who I am more freely than on the existing social media platforms.</p><p>Twitter is really nice since I can write about anything and connect with people but the limitation to 256 characters is some times too restrictive.</p><p>Instagram? I like it a lot, but some of the things I also want to explore and share like my studies of Korean or 3D sculpting make it hard, and the only way to do it is with multiple accounts, at some point it is too much context switching</p><p>I wanted a place where I can be myself without censorship and just pour everything I have, let people choose what they want to see in one single place, and maybe get a better idea of who I am.</p><p>There are some stories on my head that I need to put out somewhere, and my paintings which currently I haven&apos;t found the right place to share them.</p><p>You can expect to see a wide variety of topics, even some about programming perhaps, but mostly about topics that would fall into a philosophical conclusion.</p><p>I wanted the first post to be very meaningful, but it&apos;s 1:55am and just finished setting it up a few hours ago.</p><p>See you soon!</p>]]></content:encoded></item></channel></rss>