Free resources and subscriptions for real-time knowledge

"Awareness is power in a world where knowledge is everywhere"

An autodidact is someone who learns by themselves. They pick what they want to learn, how and when they want to learn it. According to a 2019 developer survey by StackOverflow, "almost 90% of all developers say they have taught themselves a new language, framework, or tool outside of their formal education". Many modern-day legends and entrepreneurs were self-taught. For example, Michael Dell, Travis Kalanick, and even Steve Jobs were autodidacts. Even the amazing inventors/scientists from the distant past like Tesla and Faraday were self-taught.

It suffices to say, being self-taught doesn't put a cap on your limits. There is a caveat though, on how you present and apply your knowledge. When done right, you will have access to most opportunities without any difference. In fact, it is one of the most essential skills of modern-day.

As a long time advocate for self-learning, I wanted to bring a lot more structure to it in 2021. What you are reading now is a result of years of mismatch between the modern-day industry-relevant skills/knowledge and traditional education. I myself had formal schooling and hold a bachelor's degree in engineering with a major in electronics and a minor in computer science. Unfortunately, I can't remember using a single technical concept or thing I learnt, especially in the way it was taught at school. I guess this holds well except for that one database course that taught SQL. Even there, most of it was self-taught.

At University, we did have some good courses, but the content required for exams and grades was irrelevant. I used to spend my time self-learning. In my 2nd year at college, I taught myself on using Unity3D and building a few video game prototypes. In my third year, I started exploring machine learning, which I continued till graduation. Python and Javascript are two programming languages I frequently use, once again self-taught. I think no matter what you do in life, whatever courses or programs you enrol to (or do not), self-learning is important, and that's exactly why this newsletter exists.

What to expect in this newsletter

• A guide for anyone who wants to learn something new. We will cover all fundamental strategies and resources for all famous google searches like "how to learn to code", "how to learn web development", or literally, "how to learn <anything>". All for free, and for everyone across all age groups.
• Filtered insights from my own self-learning journey in technology and management.
• Current trends and predictions curated with care and deep research.

Essentially, you will be subscribing to structured knowledge that takes a lot of time to curate. I will be spending that time so that you can save it. I will try to put out one edition every weekend when you will have some time to assimilate new inputs.

Things to track for real-time knowledge

In the pilot edition of this newsletter, I wanted to cover a topic that almost certainly requires proactive self-learning. Real-time knowledge is all about knowing what's happening right now across the world and how it will shape the near and far future. Knowing the same, one could become a front-runner in adapting to a new trend or being part of the change that's to come. Such awareness is powerful and can give a great advantage in making the right decisions and learning the right things at the right time.

For example, imagine knowing about bitcoin before the rest of the world.

Nobody can teach you things that no one else understands yet or is aware of. When you are at that edge of knowledge, you have no option but to become your own teacher.

I wanted to share some resources that I personally use for my real-time knowledge. These are completely unfiltered, essentially the trade secrets that help me in keeping up with the latest trends and the stuff I truly enjoy following. It will be a comprehensive list which I have covered once in a past LinkedIn post. Following all of them can be overwhelming. I will put it out anyways as these resources also have an influence on how this newsletter will be shaped in the coming editions.

With that said, here's my list:

• Google Alerts is one of the most efficient ways to track the latest news on any topic you want. You can directly visit the link, type the topic you like to keep up with, select the options/filters provided and set up an alert to deliver the content directly to your email.
• Google Trends is another amazing tool to keep track of what people across the world are looking for, the trending searches by geography and topic. You can subscribe this to your email too as per your preference.
• Think With Google is exactly what it reads. This is the final Google based recommendation on this list. It gives us pretty good insights on a diverse range of topics.
• Science Daily newsletters are a good resource for the latest technology and research-focused developments.
• For all the startup enthusiasts, AngelList Weekly is a place to follow.
• Morning Brew is one of the most distinct and interesting newsletters I have come across in 2020. I have been following them for a while and their content and curation is pretty rich. They also cover individual newsletters for different topics.
• If you are an AI person who is curious to know about all the cutting edge stuff happening in that field, you should check out deeplearning.ai's "The Batch". AI-Weekly is another interesting newsletter in this space.
• Product Hunt Daily holds a unique place among the newsletters I follow. It is a storehouse of ideas and new products launching every other day from across the world.
• The Daily Pitch by Pitchbook is a newsletter on startups, venture capitals and topics around that context. It gives you some insights into the business side of things.

I will update this list from time to time if I come across anything else that looks pretty useful.

Endnotes

In my recent diary entry on Medium, I talk about the plans for 2021- to make it a "year of self-learning". As a part of the same, I will be exploring a lot of topics from data science to machine learning to fill in the knowledge gaps from my previous learning experiences. I will also be exploring new topics in web/app development and beyond computer science like marketing, business, etc. while keeping a focus on using tech to do them better. You will find some of those learnings in a condensed manner in the future editions. You can follow up along with me on this journey or simply pick up bits of insights from the same.

If you find this interesting and helpful, do leave a like, a comment about anything specific you want to see in future editions, and share the newsletter with others who might find it useful.

And yes, don't forget to subscribe!

Lastly, happy new year. Here's to more self-learning!