SquidRoad

Less RSS = Less Learning

Been wondering what's been making me cranky the last few months.

Now, before you start shootin' holes in my feeling, let me submit that when I'm not learning something new, I get really, really bored. (For the record, busy does not equal bored.)

It's been about nine months since this fiasco happened and all my RSS feeds went Google Way. Aaargh. That's a challenge when a lot of your learning happens by following, oh, a few hundred blogs.

 
Also a few months ago, I mentioned how I'd gone kicking and screaming to Twitter. What pushed me over the edge was the idea of microblogging, following others' blogs and then pushing my own (or others') information in 140-character bites in an effort to share.

But it's really not the same.

While it takes a lot of content browsing to find what you want via RSS feeds, finding valuable content via Twitter is truly like looking for a needle in a haystack. It takes much, much longer and yields much, much less.

So imagine my information drought of the last several months. Heck, I'm surprised I can still read at all.

Exit my old RSS reader app. (Fine-- go to Big Brother Google!). Enter....enter...well, I'm trying a whole bunch of stuff. For starters, NewsFire and Times (screen shot shown, above).

NewsFire behaves more like my old sellout tool (I'm not at all upset about it)--makes it easy to drill down into it if you want to, although scanning info requires a few more brain cells (still looking for those). With Times, what you see is what you get--in a very slick interface. If you want to feel like you're reading the paper but online, this is your gig. Beautiful GUI...I nearly fell for it, but it's just a bit too pretty for me.

As much as I love good design, when I'm looking for information, that's all I need. Of the two RSS readers I'm trying, so far it's NewsFire.

And I'm reading three-syllable words again. That can't be all bad.

A picture can tell 1,000 words; sound tells more

I'm sitting in my second day of the Nieman Narrative Conference on Journalism @ Harvard. It's also my second time here in Boston for this event, which is definitely an in-the-trenches look at increasing forms of narrative storytelling.

The difference this year from the one in 2004 is that a new track on digital storytelling has exploded w/lots of topics, interest and participants. It's evident to me how traditional print media still is, with a very late adoption of technology.

My biggest takeaway so far is that you can use any kind of media you bring back from field reporting, and make something even better from it. Just depends on the strength of story from the different types of media gathered.

Is your sound better than images? Use it in a podcast. Is the sound OK, but images better? Mash 'em up and produce an audio slideshow. If they're both strong and add value you can run a web story, inserting audio as a standalone component in one spot, photos in another.

The example at left is a great way to use all the media you have for a project--well, ok, the best portions of it--and putting the strongest components where they will make the greatest impact.

Fun stuff that confirms for me that where we're headed at my work is right on track for where content is going in terms of being maximized.

Ahhhh....I can go home now.

Purpose-Driven, meet Karma. Karma, Purpose.

The catchprase takes on a whole new meaning.

I thought I was living under a rock...

Now I'm sure I live under a rock. Or do I?

I love to follow Google's growth, and especially developments within their labs. But this I found kind of by accident, and it is just too cool to ignore.

It's a demographic map. Just put in an address or a zip code, and you'll get this great snapshot of that area from a demo standpoint, based on Census 2000 data.

Check it out.

How to get a standing O

Seems like no one knows great presentations like Steve Jobs. And if you ever have a chance to hear Guy Kawasaki, you'll see he's no potted plant, either.

I love reading Guy, and we had the privilege years ago to hear him speak to a Mac user group in Houston. Here, learn Guy...with a little Jobs along the way.

Can you hear me now?

Just came home from a great week in the Atlanta area--Rome, GA, to be specific. And it feels like something major just changed for me. I'd say this could be the third most life-changing event of my life.

First, there was discovering at age 9 that Jesus loves me--the main reason I get up every morning.
Second, attending Perspectives five years ago. This course takes a biblical, historical, cultural and strategic look at God's movement in the world since time began. It also helped me figure out where I fit into Zee Grande Scheme of Zeengs.

And this week, the Dynamic Communicators Workshop helped me turn another corner. You've probably heard that ranked up there with people's fear of death is their fear of speaking in public. Me, I think I feared death less. Long story, but very true. Death has no sting...but public speaking--I would just shrink in fear!

DCW is for anyone who wants to communicate clearly. Whether you're a communicator-in-waiting or already accomplished and wanting to tighten your message, do yourself and your audiences a few huge favors and try it. You'll come away with:

• The ability to define what it is you're really trying to tell the listener
• The ability to define the right message for the right set of needs--the listener's
• A message that is clearer (I guarantee it) than it's ever been and
• The ability to do this for any kind of communications piece--written, spoken or visual

Think of it: better meetings, MUCH better presentations, budget proposals, sermons or devotions. A one-week investment for what I anticipate will be a lifetime of change, at least pour moi.

Like I said, I have been terrified most of my life of public speaking. Now, I'm excited about opportunities to present. Because finally, I have the tools to put together a clear message--quickly, if need be.

Look into it and, if you decide to attend in May or later, let me know how it went. I'm confident you'll get your money's worth and that the outcome will exceed your expectations.

Looking for a job?

Seems almost everyone is at least talking about it these days.

I'm coming up on an interview process that's likely to span several weeks or even months. This much I know: if it does take months, I'll just drop dead, not because of the suspense but because of the amount of work that needs to take place between now and September.

But this piece from Lisa Hanneberg's Management Craft blog is a great way to practice how you'll craft your own questions of your prospective employer. Lisa has such great insight, loaded with common sense and wisdom, on management as well as on being led, so I hit her blog as often as I can.

Tom Friedman: Scary thoughts from The World Is Flat

These are scary stats, friends. And it's not like we can make up for lost time.

Thanks, Tom Friedman (and, of course, The Future of Work blog). A lot of people don't like his perspective (I wonder what kinds of crowd he'd attract at a cocktail party). What, no ray of sunshine here? It is reality, though.

It's thrilling, on one hand, to see countries everywhere (esp. Asia) developing their talent to be globally competitive. But am I crazy to think that we're just sitting on our fat butts--figuratively and literally--and on our laurels, thinking the US can remain a superpower forever without even trying?

Globalization and the rest of the world aren't going to go away. Not only do we need to give a flip about the world, we have the huge responsibilities of raising our next generation in a way that makes them worthy competitors in the world, as well as to be good neighbors to others and good stewards of the world power we still possess.

A bit out of balance on both fronts, aren't we?

Back-posts from the week

I've really missed blogging lately, mostly the writing part. So here go I, dumping my brain clutter from the last few days. You've been warned.

Links I've found interesting, with abstract info:

Where MBAs learn the art of blue-skying (Ed: I'm digging this info)
(From bBlog's business section) If you are looking for a business school that teaches you how to think creatively, design new products and services, manage your innovations through a corporate bureaucracy, or present them to outside angel investors, Fontaine-bleau, France-based Insead, the leading European B-school, just outside Paris, may be just the place. Insead has joined with the Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif., to offer a joint program that teaches the role of creativity in business decisions, how innovation really works, and why design may be as important to corporate management today as Six Sigma was in the ’90s. A Swiss trustee who sits on both boards brought them together.”

Traveling without moving (Joi Ito)
(From Corante:GetReal) Joi Ito thinks he's said something dumb but I don't: "No matter what time zone I flip to, I have things scattered throughout the day and night almost every single day. I just realized that I have jet lag even though I'm staying in one place." Traveling without moving.

Entourage X makes me more efficient

I've recently moved to a 15" PowerBook at work. Aside from adjusting to my files being in a nice, user-friendly interface (as opposed to the not-so-nice, not-so-friendly interface that held them hostage for 2+ years), Entourage X has made an enormous difference in my ability to organize the files on my laptop.

I'd been using it for a few months on my personal laptop, so I knew the usefulness of the Project Center. But in actual working environment, this tool is powerful. Your work can be sliced and diced any way you want--by project, by person, by department, by topic...you name it. As a result, files are much easier to find and sort.

And I do mean files. Files in the form of e-mails, contacts and any other files, regardless of format, associated with your project.

More in this Macworld article. If file organization is a challenge for you, I strongly recommend Entourage X. If you're after more organization or productivity info, here's another article about revamping your Inbox.

Also: visit 43Folders and GettingThingsDone (although the latter link doesn't have as much talk about productivity as I'd like. Guess you have to buy the book--I did).