This post is really just a quick test to make sure I've got all my settings right in Typepad now that I'm adopting a few of their newer features.
How To Agree?
Paul Graham just wrote a wonderful overview of how to disagree. Go read it. I'll wait.
My guess is this was spurred by a mildly controversial post he did a few days earlier called You Weren't Meant To Have A Boss which was widely commented on.
I don't disagree with Paul. In fact I whole-heartedly agree with him.
And that's my problem. Paul didn't tell me "How To Agree". As he points out:
The web is turning writing into a conversation. Twenty years ago, writers wrote and readers read. The web lets readers respond, and increasingly they do—in comment threads, on forums, and in their own blog posts.
Many who respond to something disagree with it. That's to be expected. Agreeing tends to motivate people less than disagreeing. And when you agree there's less to say. You could expand on something the author said, but he has probably already explored the most interesting implications. When you disagree you're entering territory he may not have explored.
This post is an attempt to "agree and say something" but it is, frankly, work.
What I'd love to have is a way of saying "+1" or "I agree" or "count me in" or "what he said" or what have you.
I do this right now in subtle and ineffective ways. I bookmark a link on Delicious or Twitter it or send it via email to people who might care that I agree. But it sure would be nice to have a centralized place where we could all saying "I Agree" and just link with (or without comment) to stuff we think is correct and of value.
My short-term solution to this problem is to create a Delicious tag called "I Agree" that I'll try to use for stuff I find that I just agree with. I say "try" because it's damn hard to introduce new behaviours - even self-imposed ones - so no promises.
Crossroads Producers Killed Mary Barclay
I hadn't heard of Mary Barclay before stumbling across her obituary by the BBC.
While I know nothing about her other than what I read today I can't help thinking she'd get a good laugh from the unfortunate juxtaposition of the headline and caption in her obit:
I'm sure it wasn't overzealous Crossroads producers deciding to have a hit put out on the nonagenarian but that was my first thought.
Dick & Syl Cut The Cake
A while ago I started collecting up all the old photo albums and shoeboxes of pictures and slides that have been stored at the back of closets with the hope of starting a scanning project to share these with family and (to a lesser extent) the world.
I did a test scan and post to Flickr of my in-laws wedding photo:
I'm pretty happy with the scan given I was using an old scanner and didn't pay that much attention to my settings. I did a bit of cropping and tweaked the contrast.
And now that this photo is out there for the world to see, maybe someone can explain tome why they have a meadow full of flowers on top of their cake!
I did a test scan and post to Flickr of my in-laws wedding photo:
I'm pretty happy with the scan given I was using an old scanner and didn't pay that much attention to my settings. I did a bit of cropping and tweaked the contrast.
And now that this photo is out there for the world to see, maybe someone can explain tome why they have a meadow full of flowers on top of their cake!
How Often Does Your Calendar Clear?
I just checked my calendar to see what my week was like and nearly fainted:
I never have weeks like this.
We're not big on "standing meetings" at Tucows but I do like to make time to sit down with all my direct reports at least once a week. And I do the same with the Exec Team and Elliot. After that the rest of the week fills in pretty quickly with project-related meetings, sprint reviews, vendor discussions, customers time, and so on.
Loads of people are travelling on business or sick this week so my schedule is extremely light. Now, to be clear, this won't last. By the end of the week much of it will have filled in.
But still, it makes me realize how little time I often end up with to "do" stuff instead of talking about doing stuff. I look forward to rolling up my sleeves and getting some projects of my own going this week.
Apple Mail Makes Email More Personal
One of the things I love about Apple Mail is the way it integrates with Address Book to pull out a picture of the sender. Another is that I have installed a Plaxo plug-in that pulls up additional data and reminders from Plaxo's social network.
To see this in action, I submit a recent message from Zoe:
This pic was taken on my iPhone which synced it to Address Book. Here birthday was two days away when I took this capture and Plaxo was nice enough to remind me of this (not that I needed reminding about my daughter's birthday but you get the point).
The only problem I've had is that there is something, lord knows what, in David Crow's Plaxo data that crashes the Plaxo Plug-in and Apple Mail along with it every time I try to open a message from him. The weird thing is that I have this incredible urge to contact David to get him to fix it instead of Plaxo and Apple. :)
Who Cut The Cables?
The same people who pitted Seattle-area windshields in the spring of 1954.
Right now Techmeme is littered with people spinning wild theories on why "five undersea cables have been cut" in a short period of time.
Of course there have been some voices of reason as well.
It's really worth spending some time reading the links above - particularly the comments - to see how people react when they receive a small piece of information that doesn't fit into our every-day world-view.
Check out this digg thread for example:
This is fairly typical. A few people crying this must be a conspiracy and others wise cracking about "frickin' sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their frickin' heads" being the culprit.
Back in 2003 when SARS hit Toronto (in particular) causing mass hysteria, I posted a link to a great article about a bizarre rash of windshield pitting incidents in Seattle in 1954. For anyone getting caught up in the "cable cutting conspiracy", this is a must read.
Goodnight Emily
When I was young, one of my favourite shows was The Bob Newhart Show. And I had a major crush on Suzanne Pleshette. Actually, I guess it's more accurate to say that I had a crush on Emily her character on the show.
I was very sad to hear that she died last week. I think the news hit me a little harder than it might have because I'm currently re-watching the series on DVD. Somehow in my mind she was still in her 30s - a school teacher in Chicago.
McWrap = McCrap
The wonderful Presentation Zen pointed out that McWrap is pronounced "McCrap". I can't believe I didn't notice that before.
Now, for the win, what the heck is in that wrap? Lettuce, melon and bacon?
Hey Clown! Even Kids Don't Like You
I've hated - no loathed - clowns since I was very young. I could share several traumatic pre-school encounters with these, uh, clowns - but I won't bore you. Besides, you probably hate clowns too!
It's a fact - kids hate clowns!
LONDON — Bad news for Coco and Blinko -- children don't like clowns and even older kids are scared of them.
The news that will no doubt have clowns shedding tears was revealed in a poll of youngsters by researchers from the University of Sheffield who were examining how to improve the decor of hospital children's wards.
The study, reported in the Nursing Standard magazine, found all the 250 patients aged between four and 16 they quizzed disliked the use of clowns, with even the older ones finding them scary.
"As adults we make assumptions about what works for children," said Penny Curtis, a senior lecturer in research at the university.
"We found that clowns are universally disliked by children. Some found them quite frightening and unknowable."
Trying Out Ecto
I've generally just done my blog posts in directly in the web interface of whatever application I'm using at the moment, but I've always been interested in using an offline editor. I'm trying Ecto right now to see if I can make it work. If not, it's back to the web for me.
My Super-Clean Inbox
Over the holidays I took some time to rethink my inbox strategy and I thought I'd share my current approach with you.
For reference, that's my brand-spankin'-new inbox you're seein' here.
IMAP
I'm now using IMAP for work and home accounts. Up until now I've been a POP-guy - more out of habit than anything else. With POP you check your mail server and download anything new since the last time you checked. Typically the server then deletes its copy and what you downloaded becomes the only version you've got.
IMAP is wonderful as it allows you to keep all your messages on the server ("in the cloud") and pull down synchronized copies on as many machines as you'd like (as well as checking messages via webmail). Essentially you're doing everything on the server and just keeping local copies for back-up and offline use. This is much safer and much more convenient.
Providers
My "Work" account is (naturally) my Tucows email account running on the Tucows Email Service (yes we "eat our own dog food"). For my "Personal" mail I'm trying Google Hosted Apps for comparison purposes. I also have a separate Tucows Email Service-based address via Domain Direct for a domain I host there but haven't actively started using.
Folder Strategy
As you can see from the screenshot, I'm going for extreme simplicity. Besides the default Inbox, Draft, Sent, Trash, and Junk folders that come with both accounts, I have only added three folders to manage my messages - Actionable, Archived, and Waiting For Reply.
Zero Inbox
I use (and have for many years now) used a "Zero Inbox" approach as recommended by Merlin Mann.
I process email through-out the day, dealing with each message in turn.
1. Things I don't need to act on and can't imagine ever needing to reference again, I delete.
2. Things I don't need to act on that might (even remotely) be of use someday gets dragged to the "Archived" folder associated with the account.
3. Messages that require action but will only take a few minutes to resolve get dealt with immediately. The original message gets Archived.
4. Messages that will take more effort than I have time for are marked Unread and moved to the Actionable folder associated with the account. That means that I have a clean inbox and two folders that show the count of things I need to work on related to each role in life. In my example here you can see I've got 16 work-related messages and 2 personal messages I need to deal with. I tackle these as quickly as I can but within the context of other daily priorities so I don't let my inbox drive me.
5. Any time I send a message that I expect a reply to, I drag the sent message to my Waiting For Reply folder. I check this every few days and follow-up with the recipient if they didn't get back to me in a reasonable amount of time.
"Read The Feed"
One of the best things about moving to OS X Leopard is getting my RSS feeds directly in Apple Mail.
As you can see here, I subscribe to a bunch of feeds and group them in folders by theme so that I can check feeds in context as I have time.
"On My Mac"
One compromise on my system is this small group of folders (closed in this screenshot as they usually are in real life) that contain messages I downloaded via POP but haven't bothered to re-upload to the new IMAP Archived folders. I have about 30,000 non-IMAP message that I can search via Apple Mail if I need to reference them, but otherwise they're out of sight and mind in this closed folder list.
That's it. I'd be interested in how others are dealing with their inboxes these days or in answering any questions folks have about my system. It works for me but (as always) your mileage may vary.
