This is too hilarious not to share [via Scoble]...

Here's the source in case the embedded flash version doesn't work for you: the show with zefrank: 11-21-06.

~tod

I just noticed this story...

Search engine rivals Google, Yahoo and Microsoft are teaming up to make it easier for Web site owners to make sure their sites get included in the Web indexes, the companies are expected to announce Thursday.

The companies are adopting Google's Sitemaps protocol, available since June 2005, which enables Web site owners to manually feed their pages to Google and to check whether their sites have been crawled. Web site owners have had to follow similar processes at each of the other major search engines separately.

Now Web site owners will be able to go to one place for alerting all three major search engines to their Web pages, something they have been requesting for some time, said Tim Mayer, director of product management at Yahoo Search.

I'm glad to see some cooperation in this space. Kudos to the people who got this deal done...it's a win for the customer, you and me.

~tod

tags: microsoft, google, yahoo, search+engine

Dear Thieves,

It's been almost a year since we last saw each other. You remember don't you? When you decided that you liked my '95 Nissan 4x4 enough to take it for a drive, borrow a few parts and then forgot to return it.

I'm sure you had good intentions, but it was a pain to have it towed from the Tulalip reservation over to the junk yard. By the way, are you done with the wheels and tires yet? How about the canopy and the seats? The missing driver's seat was especially harsh, although you were kind enough to leave a cinder block for me. That was considerate of you and don't get me wrong, I appreciated the thought, but it just wasn't the same.

Anyway, enough reminiscing... It's been awhile since we saw each other. What have you been up to? Still smoking meth or are you on to something new? I still don't do any illegal drugs, but you know me, the straight one of the bunch. How are your kids and their moms? Did you get another chick pregnant or taking a break for awhile? I know the welfare money is good, but all those little bastards cost some serious dough after awhile. I'm just lucky I have a steady job with good insurance or my kid would be going to Dr. Mike in the 4th Street alley with yours instead of to the clinic where they actually have an office in a real building. And dude, have you seen the cost of diapers lately? What am I saying, you're probably still swiping them underneath your Oakland Raiders coat from Wally World. Damn, you were always the smart one!

I'm sorry I missed you today when you stopped by. It was really cool of you to check out my catalytic converter though. I appreciate you taking the time to make sure it was working properly. You didn't have to, really. I'm a bit perplexed why you took it though. I did a little research and apparently the precious metals inside, assuming that's what you wanted, are only worth around $30. Dude, I would have just given you $40 if you'd asked. Two Andrew Jacksons and we could have been square. That would have been a lot easier than taking that hack-saw to my exhaust pipe. I noticed that you had to start the cut over a few times, you might want to get a new blade.

Unfortunately, now I have to file a police report, call my insurance company to file a claim, go to a mechanic and probably spend my $500 deductible to get a new catalytic converter installed. All so you could make $30. I really wish you would have just asked me for the money...it would have been a lot easier.

Take care and I hope it's at least another year before we see each other again. No offense intended, but our annual holiday party just isn't as much fun as it used to be. Maybe I'm getting too old to appreciate all of your effort, but why don't you visit someone else next year. I won't be offended...I promise.

~tod

PS: Oh yeah, I was going to get a Zune next week [you know, the new music player by Microsoft], but now my budget will be all used up fixing my truck. It sucks because the Zune was going to be my Christmas present this year. Oh well, I suppose it will all work out in the end. I'm not sure how, but karma does have a way of taking care of things.

Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen

A month or more ago I attended a day-long class about improving my productivity through organizing my tasks and information in Outlook.  In fact, I discuss getting my email organized with the 4 Ds using the techniques from the class. I'm really digging it. I decided to take the class a few steps further and see what else I can do in my life to get more organized so I went to our group's organizational expert [hi Ed!] for some advice. He pointed me in the direction of David Allen so I picked up Getting Things Done and started reading. 

I liked it and found a lot of value. Honestly, it was another pretty easy read. I didn't do too many of [read that as 'none of'] the exercises in the book and was able to finish it in less than a week. I figured with my first read through I would just try to digest the overall concepts and then see where/how I could fit them into my life. It helped solidify several of the concepts I pulled out of the day-long class.

As is my custom, here are some specific areas that I found interesting and helpful:

• Allen bases his methodology on two key objectives:
  • "capturing all the things that need to get done -- now, later, someday, big, little, or in between -- into a logical and trusted system outside of your head and off your mind"
  • "disciplining yourself to make front-end decisions about all of the 'inputs' you let into your life so that you'll always have a plan for 'next actions' that you can implement or renegotiate at any moment"
  • Both of these objectives really rang true for me. I have always been organized, but with a bad habit of procrastinating with my decisions. Forcing myself to make decisions up front [like applying the 4 Ds when processing email] has been a tremendously positive change.
• "if it's on your mind, your mind isn't clear." Allen discusses a zen-like approach to clarity of thought and how it leads to drastic advances in our thought processes. The gist of it is that if your mind is freed from having to keep track of grocery lists, project to-dos, meeting reminders, etc. then you can let it work on the bigger issues in your life like how to design a new product or what it really might take for you to go on that dream vacation to Europe. If you write it down (physically or electronically) and store it somewhere you trust, the mental benefits/gains are exponential.
• "The big difference between what I do and what others do is that I capture and organize 100 percent of my 'stuff' in and with objective tools at  hand, not in my mind. And that applies to everything -- little or big, personal or professional, urgent or not. Everything." - I have started doing this using Outlook tasks and it really is refreshing to know that I have one place to go whenever I need to look up notes, lists or next-actions. It takes a certain amount of discipline to capture everything, as David does, but it really is liberating after awhile.
• "What's the Next Action? ... The 'next action' is the next physical, visible activity that needs to be engaged in, in order to move the current reality toward completion." - This is often an elusive thing when dealing with projects or even worse, multiple projects at the same time. Simplifying a project down to the single next action that needs to take place in order to move forward can provide clear direction...not only for yourself, but others you are working with. I see way too many project meetings that end without any clear action items and these are the projects that inevitably stall and then fizzle into nothing. Months later you find yourself asking someone 'whatever happened to project X?' Ugh.
• The Natural Planning Model -
  1. Defining purpose and principles
  2. Outcome visioning
  3. Brainstorming
  4. Organizing
  5. Identifying next actions
  • I see so many projects that exclude, ignore or forget one or more of these pieces and they always seem so unorganized. In fact, just a few weeks ago I was in a 3 hour meeting that included loads of brainstorming.  Early in the meeting I became confused [I am a late-comer to the project] and asked for # 1 or 2 above to give me some clarity. I got blank stares in return. D'oh! How can we effectively brainstorm a design or concept if we don't even know what the purpose and vision are?
• Don't be afraid to ask why. Why are we meeting? Why am I in this meeting? Why are we trying to accomplish this? Why do the requestors think they need this solution? Yada-yada-yada... Here are Allen's listed benefits of asking "why?" and I couldn't agree more:
  • It defines success.
  • It creates decision-making criteria.
  • It aligns resources.
  • It motivates.
  • It clarifies focus.
  • It expands options.
• Mind-mapping as a brainstorming exercise. This looks pretty interesting.
• Filing systems: "the lack of a good general-reference system can be one of the greatest obstacles to implementing a personal management system, and for more of the executives I have personally coached, it represents one of the biggest opportunities for improvement." - I'm a pack-rat when it comes to documents and such. I had a huge file cabinet full of stuff going back 20+ years. A lot of it was irrelevant, but more importantly it was filed very inefficiently. The system only made sense to me and was cumbersome. In a nutshell, Allen recommends making your filing system as simple as possible. Start with a simple set of folders labeled A-Z and only make specific-labeled folders for those things you need. So I spent a weekend purging my files and re-organizing them. Not only was I able to shred 65% of the files, but I simplified the system so that everything is easy to find. Bills are under B instead of a separate folder for each company, house information is in H, medical stuff is under M, etc. That was a big monkey off my back.
• Organizing action reminders - I'm still working this one out to find a way that works well for me, but Allen gives a lot of good suggestions. Basically, if something needs to be done on a certain date/time then put it on your calendar. Other next actions should be organized by context, whatever context makes the most sense to you (phone calls, errands, office, read/review, at computer, etc.).
• Weekly review - Probably one of the most important aspects to implementing Allen's system! Once you start collecting all of your thoughts/ideas/actions in a trusted place you need to review them regularly so they're not missed. The weekly review is one such point-in-time where you spend a few hours organizing the loose things (email, papers, notes, lists, etc.), reviewing your next actions, clearing your mind and double-checking yourself. Here are the things that Allen suggests for a weekly review:
  • Process all loose papers.
  • Process your notes from journal entries, meetings or scribbled reminders.
  • Review past calendar dates for remaining action items, reference information, etc.
  • Look at future calendar events for any prep work you might need to do.
  • Clear your mind by writing down all of your project ideas, action items, etc.
  • Evaluate your projects for status and any action items.
  • Review your lists (next actions, waiting for, someday/maybe) for any items that can be marked as finished or needs to be updated.
• "Your negative feelings are simply the result of breaking those agreements." Allen is referring to our agreements with ourselves when we have something in our 'inbox' or tell ourselves we will do something, but then we don't complete it. "If you tell yourself to draft a strategic plan, when you don't do it, you'll feel bad. Tell yourself to get organized, and if you fail to, welcome to guilt and frustration." We are our own worst critic, right?

Interesting quotes from the book:

• It is hard to fight an enemy who has outposts in your head. - Sally Kempton
• It does not take much strength to do things, but it requires a great deal of strength to decide what to do. - Elbert Hubbard
• Fanaticism consists of redoubling your efforts when you have forgotten your aim. - George Santayana
• The best way to get a good idea is to get lots of ideas. - Linus Pauling
• If you're not totally sure what your job is, it will always feel overwhelming. - David Allen
• Let our advance worrying become advance thinking and planning. - Winston Churchill
• People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them. - George Bernard Shaw

The thing I really liked about this book, besides all of the organizational tips/suggestions, is that Allen's basic premise is that you should find a system that works best for you. The same system will not work for everyone and he states that frequently. He suggests you use his processes, but also realizes that you might want to take a hybrid approach [what I have done] and is ok with that. He writes the book with an open mind which, in my opinion, makes him even more credible.

~tod

tags: organization, productivity, book+review

Mini-Microsoft wrote a [refreshingly semi-positive] post the other day titled Microsoft Academy. Here's a short blurb:

I'd like to see at least three-months investment in the new hires in deeply learning what we're using now across the company. For developers, it would be stuff like C/C++, Win32, COM, ATL, XML, DHTML, AJAX, .NET, debugging, performance, Watson analysis, design patterns, security, using our best internal tools and resources and so on. Working against real code for Microsoft products. Testers would get a dose of various automation technologies around the company, along with debugging and Watson analysis, too, so that they could dig deep. PMs would focus on design concepts and real-world user management and relationship building. And everyone should take some of the key professional courses on cross-group communications and effective individual leadership.

And just like academies in other real-world professions, some folks would wash-out. Fine. Better upfront than to be a deadwood burden later.

I couldn't agree more! Having made the transition from a Systems Engineer (SE) to a Software Development Engineer (SDE or dev) this would have been invaluable training for me. One and a half years later I'm only now learning about several internal tools that are going to make my job much, much easier and efficient. That's because I finally have a manager who worked his way up from the developer trenches inside the company and knows the tools and processes intimately.

For the past year I have worked closely with a strong developer [6+ years experience] who has been an awesome mentor. She has taught me so much about software development practices, object-oriented programming and .NET that I wouldn't be half the developer I am today had I not worked with her. In fact, I tell her that she can't leave our group unless she promises to find me a job too. But she has only been with Microsoft for a year and doesn't have the experience or familiarity with all of our internal tools. If she had gone through a Microsoft Academy, just think how much more effective of a developer and mentor she would have been!

Honestly, I think this is a pretty damn good idea.

~tod

I just read the article, Microsoft earns a mixed report card for its year-old Live initiative, by Mary Jo Foley. An interesting read and I agree with a lot of it, the most notable/significant being that the Live brand is not being presented or explained effectively. There is still a lot of confusion, even internally, about what constitutes Live, MSN and our other online offerings. I sincerely hope that our marketing campaign (to professionals and regular users) becomes much more explanatory and is able to deliver a clearer message than it has in the last year. The Live offerings are continually growing and getting better, but that's not going to matter if people don't know about them, what they are delivering or how to use them.

~tod

tags: live, msn