Summer Reading: What Airshippers Are Reading for Business and Pleasure – Mike Bedney

Summer is a great time to catch up on all that reading you wish you could be doing the rest of the year. Over the next few months, we’ll be highlighting team members from across Urban Airship, showcasing how they stay up-to-date on our rapidly changing industry and keep up role-specific professional development, as well as what they read for fun. Not everyone is going to admit their deep love of [insert embarrassing guilty pleasure here] unfortunately, but take a look — you may discover a new favorite “everyday” read!

This week we’re featuring one of our Technical Support Engineers, Mike Bedney’s, favorite reads (and listens!).

 

1. Dice Insights

These short blurbs were very helpful when I was on the hunt for tech jobs. It covers overall trends and offers lots of useful info on the different avenues any given career path can take you. Right now I find myself asking people in the halls “what do you do?” And after they answer with whatever title they have, I almost always need to follow up with “so what exactly does that mean?” The more I can know about the function of other teams in the building, the better!

 

2. Silicon Florist

Rick Turoczy covers a wide range of tech topics here in Portland Oregon as well as other trends in technology. This is perfect for me, as my brain is sponging up any/all information I can get my hands on! I love chatting with my coworkers to learn about their own experiences going to different events in the area.

3. Hip Chick Digs

I love to garden and my sister, Renee Wilkinson, is a landscape designer who also created Hip Chick Digs. This site has great info for things like building your own raised beds, raising chickens, taking care of your soil, canning, etc. Useful to both hardcore gardeners and those who just like to putter around. Oh, and The Onion can bring some much needed laughter to my day in the form of fake news.

Bonus: A few podcasts I listen to for fun & work

I listen to a lot of different podcasts. Here are some of my favorites with a short blurb of why they are so amazing:

My Brother, My Brother, and Me

Three brothers give advice from user submitted questions as well as from Yahoo answers. Hands down one of the funniest podcasts I’ve heard!

2 Dope Queens

Jessica Williams (from the Daily Show) and Phoebe Robinson are two comedians/best friends who bring on their favorite comedians who aren’t as well known.

Technology: NPR

These are short clips taken from NPR that cover the broad range of tech-related news. This keeps me informed on a trends, events, and what is on the horizon.