One of the bathtub faucets has leaked for a couple weeks. Monday, I could no longer ignore it. That same day, Seth Godin introduced me to Yak Shaving. yak shaving: Any seemingly pointless activity which is actually necessary to solve a problem which solves a problem which, several levels of recursion later, solves the real …
Author Archives: Garrick van Buren
Are Newspapers in the News Business or Fish-wrap Business?
Doc Searls: “If your paper is worth so much (and it is), and you want to charge for it, how about charging for fresh news, and giving away the stale stuff?” The ‘more-for-new-less-for-old’ model is a good one. Let’s take a look a couple industries where it seems to work well: Movies If Jen and …
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Van Crashes into Paper Source
UPDATE: 25 Mar 2005 This from the Paper Source’s page on their Minneapolis location If you’ve driven past our store you may have noticed that things are not what they once were. One big van crash took out half the building. The good news is that nobody was hurt. The bad news is that while …
First Crack 31. The Wine Episode with Tim Elliott
Tim Elliott, from winecast.net, and I met at Bev’s Wine Bar and talked wine, coffee, and technology. Links mentioned: WordPress Plugins; WP-iCal & WP-CaTT winecast.net Bev’s Wine Bar (CityPage Review) Haskells, The Wine People Surdyks, Liquor and Gourmet Cheese Shop Coffee Geek Reviews of the Philips Senseo Designing Disney’s Theme Parks : The Architecture of …
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Introducing WP-CaTT
Here’s the WordPress Technorati Tag plugin I mentioned a few posts back. WP-CaTT appends a link in a post’s category listings to the corresponding Technorati Tag page. In the case of this site, it’s the “(t)” you see in the category listing just above this post. Download WP-CaTT v1.0 For suggestions, comments, and all other …
Gas Prices are like Bad Haircuts
Overheard at the Dunn Bros in downtown St. Paul: “It’s like gambling, losing all that money at the gas pumps these days.” Complaining about gas prices is like complaining about a bad haircut. Each of us has the power to change the impact it has on us. In the case of cars; drive less, use …
Making a Decision is Always Better than Not.
Yesterday, I grabbed a coffee with one of the smartest people I’ve ever met. We were talking about project teams wallowing in the unknown and stalling out. He proclaimed: “Just put a stake in the ground and move on.” His recommendation reinforces Charlie Lazor’s advice, “You really won’t know until you build it.” Both of …
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Blogger Forces Company Blogging Policy Issue
Update: 9 Mar 2005 9:04 am …we do not censor people’s blogs, and we take the censorship allegation extremely seriously. I actively encourage our employees to blog, and to express their opinions. However, many readers do not make as clear a distinction between personal and work lives as many experienced bloggers do, and will view …
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‘EOM’ for ‘End of Message’ another Email Subject Line Tag
I’m starting to see more tags (see Better Email Tips) in my email subject lines. Today, I received an email canceling a meeting, with all the information contained in the subject line with “(eom)” at the end. eom: end of message I’d recommend using it when your entire message can be included in the subject …
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Overtime Hurts the Everyone
Late last week, a client and I were discussing a struggling project. The client mentioned his project team regularly works nights and weekends to meet the deadlines he had scheduled. I was stunned. This was months into a years longs project. There are 3 things fatally wrong with this management strategy: It devalues both the …