Weekend Reader – javascript, friendfeed, google, lifehacks, web2.0
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
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- [BLOGGING] Zemanta – First Impress Review, problogger.net
- Blogging software plugin that automatically suggests links and videos.
- [CODE] Why hackers FLOSS, blog.milkingthegnu.org
- Thoughts on motivating IT workers based on why people contribute open source code.
- [CSS] Timelapse CSS, matthewbuchanan.name
- Javascript for playing CSS rendering in slow motion.
- [FRIENDFEED] Blame FriendFeed, techcrunch.com
- Not sure what to make of this. Vaguely entertaining.
- [FRIENDFEED] How To Find FriendFeed Rooms With Google, andybeard.eu
- Google query to search for public rooms
- [FRIENDFEED] Keep Your Eyes On FriendFeed: It May Be The Google Of Social Networks, webomatica.com
- Why Jason things Friend Feed is one of the social apps to watch for 2008
- [GOOGLE] goosh.org – the unofficial google shell., goosh.org, via:news.ycombinator.com
- unix-like shell for google search in the web browser
- [JAVASCRIPT] Announcing AJAX Libraries API: Speed up your Ajax apps with Google’s infrastructure, ajaxian.com
- This is pretty huge for webdevs. You can let Google handle your jquery, prototype, etc libraries.
- [JAVASCRIPT] Vote! How to Detect the Social Sites Your Visitors Use, azarask.in, via:news.ycombinator.com
- Uses the same CSS hack I use for one of my Greasemonkey scripts to intelligently sense which social sites a visitor uses.
- [LIFEHACKS] An Engineer’s Guide To Weight Loss, teddziuba.com
- The simple and to the point guide to not being a fat ass engineer.
- [LIFEHACKS] How to Recycle Electronics and Get Cash Back, friedbeef.com
- I might have to try this out as I downsize my garage
- [SLEEPHACKS] Easy way to reset your sleep cycle: Stop eating, parentingsquad.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
- Temporarily adjusting your diet can be a quick way to ensure when you’ll wake up.
- [WEB2.0] Scaling Fast, lukasbiewald.com
- Scaling your web app when you’re linked to by the most trafficked page on the internet.
- [WEB2.0] StikiPad – When software in the cloud goes sour, mentalized.net, via:news.ycombinator.com
- Good reminder — only use web apps that let you backup your data
- [YOUTUBE] YouTomb, youtomb.mit.edu, via:news.ycombinator.com
- Track YouTube in real time videos as they are removed for copyright infringement.
Tags: friendfeed, google, javascript, lifehacks, web2.0
Weekend Reader – blogging, twitter, marketing, funny, lifehacks
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
- [BLOGGING] Its about respect, winextra.com
- When do you link to someone? When you’re talking about them and want to discuss their viewpoint.
- [BLOGGING] Ten FriendFeed Visitors Beats 1,000 StumbleUpons Any Day, bhc3.wordpress.com
- Why Friend Feed is a better source of traffic than Digg and StumbleUpon
- [CODE] Business of Software Forum FAQ, discuss.joelonsoftware.com
- Good info for MicroISV developers.
- [CODE] Why I’m a better software developer than you, ytechie.com
- Hey, that describes me to a tee. :)
- [CULTURE] Shift Happens, slideshare.net
- Excellent slide show showing how the world is changing and the new culture that is emerging.
- [FACEBOOK] FaceBook In Reality, youtube.com, via:codinghorror.com
- Funny video from BBC comedy group
- [GOOGLE] Share anything. Anytime. Anywhere., googlereader.blogspot.com
- Google Reader Shares might have just become the delicious killer for me.
- [ITUNES] harmony, thirteen23.com, via:lifehacker.com
- Automatic cover art downloader for Windows
- [LIFEHACKS] Life Hack Misnomer, thegrowinglife.com
- From the article: ” Repurposing your shoe holder to organize your gadgets isn’t hacking life, it’s hacking a shoe holder. Likewise, utilities used to synchronize files don’t upgrade your life, they upgrade your computer.”
- [MARKETING] 5 Great Examples of Guerilla Marketing Gone Wrong, weburbanist.com
- Except, has the guerrilla marketing gone wrong if people are still talking about it?
- [PRODUCTIVITY] The Joy of Freeing Up Mental RAM, caffeinatedcoder.com
- Intro to Getting To Done
- [SOCIALMEDIA] Are we building Universities or Amphitheaters?, weblog.raganwald.com
- Because getting your attention is more valuable than giving your life value.
- [SOFTWARE] MoMB | The Museum of Modern Betas, momb.socio-kybernetics.net
- Looking for new stuff to try out? This has a comprehensive list of betas that are available.
- [STARTUPS] From Messes To Successes, avc.blogs.com
- Applies very well to the perception people have of Twitter
- [STARTUPS] The Coolest Business Plan Ever, ricksegal.typepad.com
- Microsoft Office metadata strikes again
- [TECH] What’s Mainstream Technology? Ask Joe Average, The Spouse, Grandma, and Dave Letterman, webomatica.com
- How to figure out if tech is mainstream.
- [TWITTER] Using Twitter to track your FedEx, UPS or DHL Shipments, technofriends.in
- Neat trick, twitter @trackthis supports FedEx, UPS, USPS, DHL tracking codes to send you direct messages whenever your packages change languages.
- [TWITTER] Who Should I Follow? | Twitter Friend Recommendations, whoshouldifollow.com
- REALLY excellent tool for suggesting people to follow
- [WEB2.0] Web 2.point.Mac: Developing software on Apple computers, compsci.ca
- Many of the web2.0 companies out there are using Macs as a developer platform.
- [WORDPRESS] 13 of the best WordPress plugins, davidairey.com
- Plugins for Self-hosted
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Weekend Reader – programming, lifehacks, code, blogging, funny
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
- [BLOGGING] 70 Simple Power Tao Secret Hacks to Writing the Perfect Productivity Article, Plus a Guide & System for Doing It, thegrowinglife.com
- The ultimate guide to writing lifehack posts. :)
- [BLOGGING] A Secret to Blogging Success – Build Upon What You Build, problogger.net
- Good advice for anything, really. Always leverage what strengths you already have.
- [BLOGGING] Thurday at Noon is the best time post and be noticed (PST), 3.rdrail.net
- When is the best time to post a story that will get noticed?
- [CODE] Git forking for fun and profit, blog.labnotes.org
- Really good explanation of distributed version control and GIT and why you should git it.
- [CODE] Invitation to try out open source code review tool, mail.python.org
- Google’s Mondrian code review tool is going open source.
- [CODE] Programmers Don’t Read Books — But You Should, codinghorror.com
- Reading one programming book a year makes you a better programmer than the average.
- [COMMUNITY] Listening to Customers is Hard, Hard, Hard, continuations.wenger.us
- Some tips on how to make the most out of customer feedback.
- [CROSSLOOP] The Crossloop Community, winextra.com
- I’ve been unhappy with the social aspect of Crossloop before (namely, takes to long to get someone to install the software), but the “helper” marketplace can be a great thing.
- [DIGG] The StatBot pits Digg vs Digg, thestatbot.com
- Digg 2007 vs Digg 2008 for keywords
- [GEEK] J.K. Rowling, Lexicon and Oz, linearpublishing.com
- Harry Potter author misuses copyright to sue related work by fan she once gave an award to.
- [GEEK] Nomophobia and The Curse of The Mobile Phone, putthingsoff.com
- What kind of mobile phone user are you?
- [IPHONE] iPhone Canada: Pay me now, or pay me later, mathewingram.com
- The iPhone is coming to Canada, but will this mean data plans open up? My guess, big no. Rogers has too much of a track record when it comes to sucking.
- [LASTFM] soundamus – new and upcoming music releases from the artists you listen to, soundamus.net
- Website that gives you an RSS feed to alert you when your favs on Last.FM release new music.
- [LIFEHACKS] The Battle for Our Minds, thegrowinglife.com
- Using our minds at work all day is making us stupid.
- [SLEEPHACKS] Sleep deprivation is not a badge of honor, 37signals.com
- From the article: ” If you encounter someone who’s acting like an ass, there’s a good chance they’re suffering from sleep deprivation.”
- [SOCIALMEDIA] Greasemonkey Scripts For the Social Media Addict, readwriteweb.com
- Scripts for Twitter, FriendFeed, Digg, Delicious, Facebook, and Flickr. Several of them by yours truly.
- [TECH] Early adopter angst, scobleizer.com
- Arguments why earlier adopters do matter.
- [TECH] What’s Mainstream Technology? Ask Joe Average, The Spouse, Grandma, and Dave Letterman — Webomatica – Technology and Entertainment Digest, webomatica.com
- How to figure out if tech is mainstream.
- [TWITTER] TwitterSnooze! v0.13, twittersnooze.com
- Stop following someone for a few days.
- [WORKHACKS] Up or Out: Solving the IT Turnover Crisis, thedailywtf.com
- Embrace change, and quit your job when you start to stagnate.
Delicious Links – 20 links – google, blogging, wordpress, twitter, lifehacks
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. You can follow this list of links as I post them on Friend Feed or on Twitter. Or you can get the weekly update by subscribing to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
- [BLOGGING] 6 Ways That Bloggers are Like Rappers, copyblogger.com
- Are you down with the B.L.O.G.? Yeah, you know me!
- [BLOGGING] How to Target the Right Social Media Sites, problogger.net
- Howto guide for bloggers on using sites like Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon to generate traffic.
- [BLOGGING] the thorny issue of blog comment ownership, nbrightside.com
- Who owns a comment?
- [CODE] Google REST Search API, blogoscoped.com
- This could be useful for web apps.
- [CODE] We need a Wikipedia for data, bret.appspot.com
- Where is the open source database for map info, whitepages, movie times, music info, etc.
- [FIREFOX] Why downloading Firefox is like getting into college, sethgodin.typepad.com, via:avc.blogs.com
- From the article: ” In the lingo of Nancy Reagan, Firefox is a gateway drug.”
- [GEEK] My Cat Bubba Posts Videos and Twitters using an EeePC and Ubuntu, fsckin.com, via:webomatica.com
- It’s a pretty static video of the cat eating, but nice hack.
- [LIFEHACKS] From 10000 to 0 Emails in an Inbox in 24 Hours, problogger.net
- Switching to Gmail to become more productive with email.
- [LIFEHACKS] Just say NO to crap!, squawkfox.com, via:skelliewag.org
- The ultimate decluttering tip is not to consume.
- [STARTUPS] We Need A New Path To Liquidity, avc.blogs.com
- From the article: ” what happens when a company gets purchased: The service languishes. The team leaves. It stops getting better. And often gets worse.”
- [STARTUPS] What the New York Times “death by blogging” story got right., calacanis.com
- From the article: ” In some ways I think I’ve realized that life is just a big video game and if one game doesn’t work out you put another quarter in and try again.”
- [TWITTER] Improving Twitter, kungfugrippe.com
- Merlin Mann’s ideas for how to improve twitter. He’s one of my favorite people to follow on Twitter
- [TWITTER] Twubble, crazybob.org
- Twitter friend of a friend finder.
- [WEB2.0] AppEngine World: your one-stop resource for Google App Engine, appengineworld.com, via:marshallk.com
- AppEngine news aggregator. I wish I had an AppEngine account :(
- [WEB2.0] Google App Engine, code.google.com
- Google releases blogspot for web applications.
- [WEB2.0] Mulling On Google App Engine, al3x.net
- Alex Payne (of Twitter)’s thoughts on the new appengine
- [WORDPRESS] Coming Soon: My Personal WordPress Theme Starting Point, themeshaper.com
- Ian is releasing his Sandbox-plus-plus theme with some stuff from BluePrint CSS. I’ve been waiting 9 months for this. :)
- [WORDPRESS] The Great WordPress Attack, psionmark.com
- If you aren’t running WP 2.5, your site is probably hacked.
- [WORKHACKS] The Case Against Overtime, caffeinatedcoder.com
- Compelling arguments as to why you shouldn’t work overtime as a programmer.
- [WPDESIGN] Raising Personal Standard for Paid WordPress Themes, wpdesigner.com
- What a WordPress theme should include.
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Delicious Links – 20 links – friendfeed, lifehacks, blogging, programming, wordpress
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together for my blog on Internet Duct Tape.
Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
- [BLOGGING] The Conversation Has Left the Blogosphere, readwriteweb.com, via:friendfeed.com
- Examples for bloggers on where to find and how to manage all the conversations that are happening OUTSIDE of your blog about your blog content.
- [CODE] Google Code University, code.google.com, via:lazycoder.com
- Google is putting together tutorials about programming subjects for university level. Good refreshers.
- [DIGG] 12 Must-Have Tools for Active Digg Users, doshdosh.com
- This is a *KILLER* list. The extensions I’ve already tried on the list are must haves, and the rest look even better.
- [EMAIL] Do Not Reply, donotreply.com, via:codinghorror.com
- Many companies use @donotreply.com for their automatic emails. What they don’t realize is that donotreply.com is a real web address and he’s posting the contents of the emails! IT security at its worst.
- [FRIENDFEED] FriendFeed is for Lurkers too, oracleappslab.com
- How FriendFeed is becoming a user generated content repository for the parts of the web that people are actively creating.
- [FRIENDFEED] Friendfeed Grid, blogoscoped.com, via:louisgray.com
- A random look at the people on Friend Feed.
- [FRIENDFEED] Hack to Get an RSS Feed from FriendFeed Search Results, lifestreamblog.com, via:techcrunch.com
- FriendFeed is a lifestreaming aggregator. Here’s some tips for getting RSS feeds from it.
- [FRIENDFEED] How FriendFeed Became Internet Famous, runningwithfoxes.com, via:friendfeed.com
- An analysis about how FF became the “IT” webapp of 2008.
- [INTERNET] George Clooney, esquire.com
- Esquire sits down with Clooney and goes through a Google search of his life. Interesting from the geeky POV of all the information that is out there, and how accurate is it, really?
- [JAVASCRIPT] EJS – JavaScript Templates, embeddedjs.com, via:gilesbowkett.blogspot.com
- I might be able to use this with rss2html to work with Yahoo Pipes formatted data
- [LIFEHACKS] 5 Tools to Track How Much Time you Waste while Online, makeuseof.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
- I recommend RescueTime out of the list they have. The best suggestion might be “unplug your internet connection when you’re trying to get work done”
- [LIFEHACKS] The Top 100 Productivity and Lifehack Blogs, collegedegree.com, via:readwriteweb.com
- Huge list of lifehack blogs organized by topic.
- [LIFEHACKS] Wisdom from the way-out edge, theage.com.au, via:chipsquips.com
- From the article: ” Reward risk, risk is good. Trust crazy people. Believe in yourself, everyone else is faking it. Find the real problem to solve.”
- [MARKETING] Nomadic Growth: Moving to Greener Pastures, skelliewag.org
- In order to keep expanding your audience you have to keep reaching out to new plateaus.
- [SOCIALSOFTWARE] Relationships are complicated, factoryjoe.com
- What works better: asking users to explicitly list their relationship with people, or viewing how they interact with people and deducing the relationships from there?
- [STARTUPS] How To Use Perks and Rewards in Startups to Get The Best Talent, instigatorblog.com
- Anywhere could hire me away if they offered me the best-of-breed source control, chat, backup and allowed me to attend conferences.
- [TWITTER] favotter, favotter.matope.com
- It’s like twitter.com/popular — a list of tweets that have been favorited a lot. Pretty entertaining.
- [WEBDESIGN] 101 Five-Minute Fixes to Incrementally Improve Your Web Site, insidecrm.com
- If you run a website then there’s some gems in here you haven’t thought of in a while. In depth advice on each item is available.
- [WORDPRESS] 10 Things You Need to Know About WordPress 2.5, technosailor.com, via:andybeard.eu
- I can’t wait until we get some of this stuff on WordPress.com
- [WORDPRESS] More WordPress Theme Viewer Screenshots, winextra.com
- Preview screenshots of the new WordPress theme viewer
- Powered by Delicious Links Pro
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Delicious Links – 13 links – programming, lifehacks, productivity, geek, games
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together for my blog on Internet Duct Tape.
Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
- [BLOGGING] 10 Reasons Why Bloggers Hate Blogging, geeksaresexy.net, via:chipsquips.com
- because it’s a beast that never stops being hungry.
- [BLOGGING] Comparing Six Ways to Identify Top Blogs in Any Niche, readwriteweb.com, via:twitter.com
- …and they all suck. How do you find good resources around a niche?
- [BLOGGING] Scaling Yourself, chrisbrogan.com, via:problogger.net
- Some good thoughts on time management when you’re working for yourself / by yourself
- [EMAIL] How to Stop Checking Email on the Evenings and Weekends, lifehacker.com
- tips for email management
- [GAMERS] Criterion Collection: Xbox 360 Games You MUST Own, thegamereviews.com, via:digg.com
- List of the best Xbox 360 games.
- [GEEK] George Lucas Will Sell Your Dreams For Candy, io9.com
- Star Wars merchandising that never was. High quality artwork.
- [MOVIES] 2008 Movie Sequel Guide, geeksofdoom.com, via:digg.com
- A geek’s guide to the sequels.
- [MUSIC] Sources For Free & Legal Music, seanpaune.com
- List of free sites with legal music downloads
- [REPUTATION] What happened to me and the new girl (or: –The girl who cried Webmaster–), joeydevilla.com, via:weblog.raganwald.com
- Ugh. Reminder that there are crazy people out there.
- [RUBY] Do not learn Ruby, webmat.wordpress.com, via:ruby.reddit.com
- The downside of embracing Ruby
- [WEBDESIGN] Internet ’96, msu.edu, via:digg.com
- A look at major corporate websites in 1996.
- [WORKHACKS] Five steps to enlightened expectations, blogs.techrepublic.com.com, via:weblog.raganwald.com
- How to manage expectations
- Powered by Delicious Links Pro
This Week at Internet Duct Tape
Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.
This Week at IDT Labs
IDT Labs is where I announce new software I’m working on.
- [GREASEMONKEY] The Pirate Bay + Rotten Tomatoes = Crazy Delicious
This script will create links to Rotten Tomatoes while browsing the Pirate Bay.
Tags: lifehacks, productivity, programming
Delicious Links – 20 links – blogging, programming, ruby, photography, copyright
This is my weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together for my blog on Internet Duct Tape.
Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape using RSS or using email.
- [BLOGGING] Feel Free to Steal My Content, zenhabits.net
- ZenHabits goes open source
- [BLOGGING] My next book: the story of blogs, wordyard.com
- Scott Rosenberg’s next book is the history of blogs
- [BLOGGING] What Are Your Anti-Memes?, smoothspan.wordpress.com
- Some thoughts on the type of articles one of my fav tech bloggers usually skips over.
- [CODE] Let The System Design Itself, gilesbowkett.blogspot.com
- From the article: ” 1) runs all the tests, 2) contains no duplication, 3) expresses every idea you want to express, 4) minimal number of classes and methods. When you work with these rules, you pay attention only to micro-design matters.”
- [CODE] Rich Programmer Food, steve-yegge.blogspot.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
- Why programmers need to know how to write a compiler. I really enjoyed reading this one.
- [CODE] Valued Lessons: Garlic Programmers for Silver Code?, valuedlessons.com, via:news.ycombinator.com
- How can you measure programmer productivity when the biggest factor is the code base they are working on?
- [COMMENTS] Reading Apptitude Questions rather than Captcha, lemurcatta.org
- Interesting idea: prove that the reader read the article before posting a comment.
- [GAMERS] 18 Undiscovered Websites Every Gamer Should Know, dailybits.com
- Some cool stuff in there, like the indie game awards
- [LIFEHACKS] Let Me Save You $40: Here’s How to Be Happy, enfranchisedmind.com, via:codinghorror.com
- 7 things you can change about your outlook to life that will greatly improve your enjoyment of it.
- [LIFEHACKS] New RescueTime Goals and Alerts Actually Helps Rescue your Time, blog.rescuetime.com
- RescueTime now has goal tracking so you can limit yourself to checking feeds for only three hours a week, for example.
- [LIFEHACKS] The Five Browser Shortcuts Everyone Should Know, codinghorror.com
- Have a better experience surfing the web with these shortcuts. There were a few I didn’t know.we
- [MEDIA] What My Kids Tell Me About The Future of Media, avc.blogs.com
- A look at how children consume mass media
- [PHOTOS] A Savvy Approach to Copyright Messaging, powazek.com
- Cool trick to add copyright notices to your photos without having to worry about people seeing them unless they’re trying to copy them.
- [PHOTOS] Namexif (Rename EXIF Photos), digicamsoft.com, via:noheat.com
- Rename your photos by date. Uses the info from your camera rather than the file date.
- [RAILS] 10 Alternative Ruby Web Frameworks, rbazinet.wordpress.com, via:lazycoder.com
- [RAILS] How to ruin a Rails project, dataconstellation.com, via:labnotes.org
- How many of these have you done?
- [RAILS] Ruby on Rails Handbook, railshandbook.com, via:virtualhosting.com
- Tons of cheatsheets and tutorials
- [RUBY] TreeTop, treetop.rubyforge.org, via:blog.zenspider.com
- ruby extension to make it easy to create new expression grammars
- [WORDPRESS] WordPress Plugin: Socialize Me!, blahblahtech.com, via:dailyblogtips.com
- When people come to your blog via a social bookmarking site, it will welcome them and prompt them to add you as a friend.
- [WRITING] That to This, randsinrepose.com
- 10 tips Rands learned that made him a better writer
- Powered by Delicious Links Pro
This Week at Internet Duct Tape
Internet Duct Tape is my blog where I talk about software, technology, blogging and other geeky subjects.
- Year in Review – Most Popular Posts of 2007
- Year in Review
- My Favorite Albums of 2007
- New Year’s Resolutions for 2008: release my “Best of” lists in the beginning of January, not at the end of January.
- Yahoo Pipe: Sub-Reddit Feed Filter
- Popular social bookmarking site Reddit has announced a great new feature: users can create their own sub-reddit. What does this mean in English? Users and communities can create their own social bookmarking sites around specific topics: blogging, wordpress, specific programming languages, etc but…
- How to Play Downloaded Videos on Your iPod, Xbox 360, or DVD Player
- I’ve been slumming through the support forums at answers.yahoo.com lately and this is a question I see come up often: how do I download a video and put it on my electronic device? More and more consumer electronics devices that can play videos, but that means we have to learn more about the big,…
- Delicious Links – 20 links – writing, programming, javascript, jquery, testing
- Tags: javascript, jquery, programming, writing
This Week at IDT Labs
IDT Labs is where I announce new software I’m working on.
- [PIPES] Filtered Technorati Recent Mentions
My Filtered Technorati Recent Mentions pipe works again. It can give you an RSS feed of the latest blogs that links to your blog. - [GREASEMONKEY] Userscripts.org Popular Scripts v0.2
Updated my script for identifying the most popular Greasemonkey scripts on userscripts.org
Tags: blogging, copyright, lifehacks, photography, productivity, programming, ruby, rubyonrails
9 Ways to Know When to Jump Ship at a Startup
For the last couple of months I’ve been plagued with wondering if I should stay at my current startup. I’ve been approached with a few different job offers that I haven’t followed up on, and maybe it’s time I pursued greener pastures. In the words of the Clash: should I stay or should I go now?
Indecision
Changing jobs is a big, life altering decision and if you have my knack for risk avoidment it can be a horrendous see-saw of uncertainty. It’s this state of uncertainty that is ultimately the cause of the most unhappiness in your life. Leaving your options open is always less satisfactory than making a firm decision.
Compensation
When comparing offers from other companies, you need to compare the full package which is a lot harder than it looks.
- Health benefits / Health insurance
- Overtime compensation
- Pension plans / Pension matching
- Stock purchase plans / Stock discount
- Stock options / equity
- Travel allowance / food allowance
- Raises
In particular it’s very hard to figure out what stock options are worth, if anything. The best advice I’ve read is that your stock options aren’t worth considering in any compensation comparison unless you are a founder.
This wiki page does a very good job of explaining how any employee can figure out what their pre-IPO equity is worth. What’s most important is to figure out the percentage of total options and how much funding the options are worth. Don’t forget to include capital gains tax (eg: 40%) when figuring out how much those options are worth.
More information on equity dilution
Business Plan
When will the startup be profitable? How much money has been invested in the company? How much more funding is needed until the startup can stand on its own legs? The more you can find out about this, the better off you’ll be, because you can’t accurately evaluate your monetary compensation and the future of the company without it.
At my previous job I was making more money than I am now, plus there was an average of a 5-8% raise per year. Startups often have no salary increases until they are profitable, or at least have revenue on the books. When you look at the roadmap to profitability you need to factor this in so you can evaluate if the potential payoff if the startup does well comes close to matching the potential revenue lost working at another company.
Bankruptcy
Most startups fail. The most likely outcome of working at a startup is showing up to work one day and finding the doors locked. There may be no compensation package for the newly unemployed workers until they land another job. Waiting for a golden handshake from downsizing is a worse idea than acting on an opportunity that has presented itself at a different company.
Technical Debt
Startups cut corners. You may not have the best tools available to get the job done. You are always squeezed for time and money, which means quality suffers. Poor quality can throw a monkey wrench into schedules, forcing crunch time in order to meet the delivery dates. This technical debt is just like any other debt in that it requires interest payments and you’ll have to pay it off eventually — although project managers often ignore it completely. Steve McConnell covers technical debt in more detail.
Signs of Success
Success should happen early. If things are always running smoothly then the work environment will be enriching and enjoyable. If things never work properly the first time then it can create a big cloud of doom that hangs over the head of everyone in the company and curses the new work being done.
Positive Reinforcement
How are employees reinforced for good work? In a startup, it usually won’t be monetary but that’s ok because one of the best rewards is the time to work on pet projects. Interesting work is its own reward.
Work Experience
Monetary compensation might pay off the bills, but it won’t make you feel as satisfied as a job well done. What makes me happiest is learning/improving new skills and knowing that I’ve done a good job. Having to constantly return to the same project that never works properly is one of the most soul-sucking experiences I’ve ever had. It’s like a bad relationship that drags on and on. You’re trying to make things work, but there’s always something new that comes up and drags you back into old issues that you thought were worked out a long time ago.
“Will I enjoy the work?” is the one of the most important criteria for evaluating a job change, because passion can’t be faked and it’s the only way a job will enrich the rest of your life.
People
Jeff hit the nail so squarely on the head when he said that the most accurate predictor of job satisfaction and success is if you like the people you work with. No matter what the problem is, it’s a people problem and if you don’t enjoy working with your coworkers then you’ll never enjoy your job.
Did you like this post? If so then please vote for it on digg. Thanks!
Related Posts
Best of Feeds – 26 links – programming, webdesign, javascript, design, tips
RSS feeds are like cookies (that are good enough for me). Best of Feeds is a weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet this week. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together on Saturdays. I don’t blog on the weekend so read these links instead.Subscribe to //engtech to see this every week (or get it by email).
- [JAVASCRIPT] Ext JS – JavaScript Library for Web Windows
- Interesting javascript library for doing web windows. Has a nice spreadsheet display.
- (extjs.com 3318 100 6 )
- [JAVASCRIPT] Welcome to Tablecloth
- Javascript code for doing quick table highlighting
- (cssglobe.com 1767 100 1247 )
- [WEBDESIGN] 30 Usability Issues To Be Aware Of
- common tips, good for beginners
- (smashingmagazine.com 1705 100 781 )
- [SQL] A Visual Explanation of SQL Joins
- Jeff, where were you in 1997 when I needed this!?
- (codinghorror.com 1069 67 9 )
- [DESIGN] 10 Usability Nightmares You Should Be Aware Of
- (smashingmagazine.com 874 100 253 )
- [DESIGN] So you want to create WordPress themes huh?
- 16 how-tos on building a wordpress theme
- (wpdesigner.com 585 100 21 )
- [SLEEPHACKS] Top 10 Ways to Sleep Smarter and Better
- LifeHacker has the goods on beating insomnia
- (lifehacker.com 546 68 1489 )
- [JAVASCRIPT] Help! I Don’t Know JavaScript!
- Collection of intros to javascript
- (blog.mootools.net 470 10 27 )
- [GAMES] Science Museum – Launchpad Online – Launchball
- Very cool little physics simulator game.
- (sciencemuseum.org.uk 392 100 947 )
- [GIFTS] 30 Frugal Gift Ideas to Show You Appreciate Someone
- Holidays are coming up…
- (zenhabits.net 326 25 669 )
- [CODE] 10 Things Every Programmer Should Know For Their First Job
- General, but true.
- (applematters.com 172 19 4 )
- [RUBY] Mr. Neighborly’s Humble Little Ruby Book
- Another free Ruby ebook
- (infoq.com 53 33 )
- [WEIGHTLOSS] Geek Diet and Exercise Programs
- All familiar links and photos to me, but still a good roundup.
- (codinghorror.com 44 35 46 )
- [INTERNET] The Life and Death of Jesse James
- The scariest people in the world are the lonely people, and this true story strikes it home for me with full force. This is essential reading for anyone who spends a lot of time in internet culture.
- (laweekly.com 40 18 )
- [RAILS] Two months with Ruby on Rails
- Two months checkin with what he doesn’t like about Rails
- (t-a-w.blogspot.com 39 10 )
- [BOOKS] Hard Work, No Pay: What’s the Point?
- Petzold on being an author of programming books. Response to Jeff Atwood post.
- (charlespetzold.com 30 12 )
- [TWITTER] Twitter is Paying My Rent
- Why Twitter is a great tool for a first class tech blogger.
- (marshallk.com 25 7 20 )
- [BOOKS] Expert Advice: Websites for the Book Lover
- Quite a few sites I hadn’t heard of.
- (makeuseof.com 24 4 20 )
- [DELICIOUS] Readeroo
- Simple browser extension for marking items “to be read” later and then marking them as read when you’re done.
- (monsur.com 21 5 )
- [WEB2.0] Q&A: Foul-Mouthed Blogger Ted Dziuba Tells Why Most Startups Fail
- Uncov in wired! What.the.fuck!
- (wired.com 19 31 4 )
- [WEB2.0] Tim O’Reilly – Graphing Social Patterns
- Liveblogging notes from Tim O’Reilly’s presentation.
- (allfacebook.com 9 )
- [BOOKS] When Completing a Book Depends on Someone Else
- Blogging Heroes should be in print soon. I was interviewed for the book, not sure if I made it into the final cut.
- (mikebanks.blogspot.com)
- [COPYRIGHT] Happiness In Slavery No More: Nine Inch Nails Goes Record Label Free
- Fans and artists are learning to bypass the recording industry.
- (parislemon.com)
- [FICTION] The ride home
- From the article: ” People with happy lives don’t go on quests, they lead their happy lives.”
- (beatsentropy.com 3 )
- [CODE] Getting rid of the use global contstants file
- Another post from my old friend who used to bring me subway cookies at raves.
- (dlowe-wfh.blogspot.com)
- [MARKETING] The Smart Way to Get Traffic and Links: Creating a Prospect List for Bloggers
- This is the proper way to promote yourself with other bloggers. Get on their radar before you ever approach them about anything.
- (doshdosh.com 3 )
Legend
- saves – number of people who bookmarked on http://del.icio.us
- inbound links – number of blogs who linked to it (max 100)
- diggs – number of people who dugg on http://digg.com
This Week at Internet Duct Tape
- What I’m Playing: PC, Nintendo DS, Xbox 360
- I’m on day 10 of “one of those weeks” so I haven’t had time to fully develop the usual cornucopia of rainbow-coloured blog post ideas. All of my time has been spent on work and family with a smidgen of video game playing to decompress my brain. This isn’t one of those…
- The Holiday Spread – Group Weight Loss Game
- This past weekend was Thanksgiving (aka Turkey Day) in Canada, which means seeing your family and eating a lot of food together. One of the favourite pastimes at any holiday is pointing out who’s gained weight and who hasn’t. This got me thinking: one of the principals of successful dieting…
- Best of Feeds – 34 links – programming, google, lifehacks, ruby, funny
- Tags: blogging, estimation, free, funny, google, gtd, javascript, lifehacks, productivity, programming, rails, ruby, rubyonrails, search, seo, tips
This Week at IDT Labs
- [WORDPRESS] Extract Comments or Trackbacks only from the Comments Feed
- I’ve created two Yahoo Pipes for building filters of the comments feed on your WordPress blog so that you can see comments only or trackbacks only. WordPress Comment Extractor WordPress Trackback Extractor
- [RSS] Tagosphere
- Tagosphere is an example I created for Jon Udell that builds an RSS feed around a specific tag using delicious, flickr, technorati, and wordpress.com.
- [GTD] Distraction Free GTD UpdateNow with 36 applications + fixes some problems with apps that don’t support https .
Tags: blogging, design, fun, javascript, lifehacks, programming, rails, tips, usability, web2.0, webdesign, writing
The Holiday Spread – Group Weight Loss Game
This past weekend was Thanksgiving (aka Turkey Day) in Canada, which means seeing your family and eating a lot of food together. One of the favourite pastimes at any holiday is pointing out who’s gained weight and who hasn’t. This got me thinking: one of the principals of successful dieting is public accountability. Could we use these family get-togethers as a way to motivate each other to lose weight? So I’ve invented a game I like to call the Holiday Spread.
Family holidays are usually spaced two to three months apart, so that’s long enough to make a noticeable dent in the waistline without being so long that you’ll lose motivation to keep playing.
The Weight In – Holiday #1 (eg: Thanksgiving)
The reason why this has holidays as the start and end is that you can get everyone together in one spot and publicly weigh each other with the Official Scale. Since everyone will be weighed at the same time, in the same place, with the same scale then there will be no whining about variation. Write down the weights on two pieces of paper and have everyone sign or initial beside their weight. You’ll be repeating this process at the next holiday to determine your weight spread.
The Stakes
Have everyone put money into the pot as an incentive to keep playing. The real prize is the lost weight, but if that was motivator enough then there wouldn’t be any point in playing this game in the first place. You want to find the sweet spot where there’s enough of a buy-in that people will want to participate, but not so much that they’ll turn into sore losers if they don’t win. The overall pot should be high enough that the players can visualize something special they want to buy if they win. You’re aiming for a significant amount of cash for motivation and to engage the competitive spirit, but not so much that it can cause hardship and stress. Make sure the game coordinator gets the buy-in as close as possible to the initial weigh-in. This is family we’re talking about, so chances are people will opt-out if you wait too long and they don’t think they can win.
2 ppl 3 ppl 4 ppl 5 ppl 6 ppl 7 ppl $20 $40 $60 $80 $100 $120 $140 $25 $50 $75 $100 $125 $150 $175 $50 $100 $150 $200 $250 $300 $350 $75 $150 $225 $300 $375 $450 $525 $100 $200 $300 $400 $500 $600 $700 $125 $250 $375 $500 $625 $750 $875 $150 $300 $450 $600 $750 $900 $1,050 $200 $400 $600 $800 $1,000 $1,200 $1,400 Individual Buy-in versus Number of Players gives Size of Pot
Rule Variation – Weight Loss for Christmas
I’m not a big fan of Christmas, so you can try to convince everyone to put the money they would have spent on Christmas gifts into the pot instead. Good luck with that.
Rule Variation – Multiple Winners
If the pot is big enough then you can have 1st and 2nd place winners to increase the chance of winning something.
The Scoring – Holiday #2 (eg: Christmas)
At the next holiday you repeat the same process of weighing each other. You’re again weighing everyone at the same time, in the same place, with the same scale so that should accounts for all variation. There are a couple of different ways you can score it.
Scoring Method #1 – Pounds Lost
This has the advantage of being dead simple: take what the scale said in October and subtract it from what the scale said in December. That’s your spread. It gives a slight advantage to the more obese (but you could also argue that they’re the ones who need to lose the weight most so any incentive helps).
If you’re 6’0″ and go from 190 lbs to 180 lbs that gives a score of 10.0 (tie)
If you’re 5’10” and go from 220 lbs to 210 lbs that gives a score of 10.0 (tie)
If you’re 5’6″ and go from 180 lbs to 170 lbs that gives a score of 10.0 (tie)
Scoring Method #2 – Percentage Body Weight Lost
One way to try and make things more “fair” is to use the percentage of body weight lost instead of the absolute number of pounds. This gives a big disadvantage to the more heavy set.
- SCORE = 100 * (INITIAL_WEIGHT – FINAL_WEIGHT) / INITIAL_WEIGHT
1 lb 2 lbs 3 lbs 5 lbs 7 lbs 10 lbs 15 lbs 100 lbs 1.00 2.00 3.00 5.00 7.00 10.00 15.00 110 lbs 0.91 1.82 2.73 4.55 6.36 9.09 13.64 120 lbs 0.83 1.67 2.50 4.17 5.83 8.33 12.50 130 lbs 0.77 1.54 2.31 3.85 5.38 7.69 11.54 140 lbs 0.71 1.43 2.14 3.57 5.00 7.14 10.71 150 lbs 0.67 1.33 2.00 3.33 4.67 6.67 10.00 160 lbs 0.63 1.25 1.88 3.13 4.38 6.25 9.38 170 lbs 0.59 1.18 1.76 2.94 4.12 5.88 8.82 180 lbs 0.56 1.11 1.67 2.78 3.89 5.56 8.33 190 lbs 0.53 1.05 1.58 2.63 3.68 5.26 7.89 200 lbs 0.50 1.00 1.50 2.50 3.50 5.00 7.50 210 lbs 0.48 0.95 1.43 2.38 3.33 4.76 7.14 220 lbs 0.45 0.91 1.36 2.27 3.18 4.55 6.82 230 lbs 0.43 0.87 1.30 2.17 3.04 4.35 6.52 240 lbs 0.42 0.83 1.25 2.08 2.92 4.17 6.25 250 lbs 0.40 0.80 1.20 2.00 2.80 4.00 6.00 Initial Weight versus Pounds Lost gives Percentage Loss
If you’re 6’0″ and go from 190 lbs to 180 lbs that gives a score of 5.26
If you’re 5’10” and go from 220 lbs to 210 lbs that gives a score of 4.55
If you’re 5’6″ and go from 180 lbs to 170 lbs that gives a score of 5.56 (winner)
Scoring Method #3 – Body Mass Index (BMI)
The fairest way to measure the weight loss that is still easily calculable without getting callipers and a health professional is to use height and weight by calculating your changing in body mass index (BMI).
- BMI = ( Weight in Pounds / ( Height in inches ) x ( Height in inches ) ) x 703
- SCORE = (703*(INITIAL_WEIGHT / HEIGHT^2)) – (703*(FINAL_WEIGHT / HEIGHT^2))
60 (5’0″) 62 (5’2″) 64 (5’4″) 66 (5’6″) 68 (5’8″) 70(5’10”) 72 (6’0″) 100 lbs 19.53 18.29 17.16 16.14 15.20 14.35 13.56 110 lbs 21.48 20.12 18.88 17.75 16.72 15.78 14.92 120 lbs 23.43 21.95 20.60 19.37 18.24 17.22 16.27 130 lbs 25.39 23.77 22.31 20.98 19.76 18.65 17.63 140 lbs 27.34 25.60 24.03 22.59 21.28 20.09 18.99 150 lbs 29.29 27.43 25.74 24.21 22.80 21.52 20.34 160 lbs 31.24 29.26 27.46 25.82 24.33 22.96 21.70 170 lbs 33.20 31.09 29.18 27.44 25.85 24.39 23.05 180 lbs 35.15 32.92 30.89 29.05 27.37 25.82 24.41 190 lbs 37.10 34.75 32.61 30.66 28.89 27.26 25.77 200 lbs 39.06 36.58 34.33 32.28 30.41 28.69 27.12 210 lbs 41.01 38.41 36.04 33.89 31.93 30.13 28.48 220 lbs 42.96 40.23 37.76 35.51 33.45 31.56 29.83 230 lbs 44.91 42.06 39.48 37.12 34.97 33.00 31.19 240 lbs 46.87 43.89 41.19 38.73 36.49 34.43 32.55 250 lbs 48.82 45.72 42.91 40.35 38.01 35.87 33.90 Weight versus Height gives BMI for that Weigh-in
If you’re 6’0″ and go from 190 lbs to 180 lbs that gives a score of 1.36
If you’re 5’10” and go from 220 lbs to 210 lbs that gives a score of 1.43
If you’re 5’6″ and go from 180 lbs to 170 lbs that gives a score of 1.61 (winner)
Rule Variation – Weekly Weigh-ins
One variation to the rules could be forcing a weekly weight check-in with the coordinator in order to keep being a contender for the pot of money. Another principal of successful dieting is weekly weigh-ins to keep on track, so this rule is there to promote that habit. It doesn’t have to be done publicly like the initial and final weigh-ins, it can be an email or a phone call to the coordinator. The goal is to keep people on the weight loss wagon, and if people do drop out then it increases the odds / motivation for the people who are still in the running. Successful weight loss is gradual over time, not a cottage cheese crash at the end.
The Holiday Spread
Put down a spread of money, and lose the spread of your belly by the next time you sit down for a huge spread of food.
Related Posts
Best of Feeds – 34 links – programming, google, lifehacks, ruby, funny
RSS feeds are like cookies (that are good enough for me). Best of Feeds is a weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet this week. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together on Saturdays. I don’t blog on the weekend so read these links instead.Subscribe to Internet Duct Tape to see this every week (or get it by email).
- [LIFEHACKS] The Printable CEO
- Collection of PDFs for task/hour tracking.
- (davidseah.com 949 100 7 )
- [BOOKMARKING] toread – an email-based bookmark service
- Simple service to use to track stuff ‘to read later’. They store the top 10 for each day. It’s like having an archive of the delicious popular list.
- (toread.cc 938 100 440 )
- [RUBY] The Little Book Of Ruby
- 85 page guide to the ruby language syntax, free ebook
- (sapphiresteel.com 492 38 28 )
- [CODE] Software Is Hard
- *Excellent* article about software estimation and Rosenberg’s Dreaming in Code
- (gamearchitect.net 449 68 15 )
- [STARTUPS] The Future of Web Startups
- Paul Graham on how web startups will start to be standardized and easy to do… which will change everything.
- (paulgraham.com 443 100 671 )
- [LIFEHACKS] Top 100 Productivity Blogs
- I’m not on the list, but many there’s a lot of great finds on here.
- (whitepapers.org 440 44 53 )
- [RUBY] Ferret – full text search engine
- I’m wondering if this could be a replacement for intranet text search?
- (ferret.davebalmain.com 429 )
- [JAVASCRIPT] The Elements of JavaScript Style
- Everything you need to know about writing good javacsript.
- (javascript.crockford.com 336 30 )
- [ESTIMATION] Web Worker 101: Estimating Basics
- Nothing new, but good round-up for people who have trouble estimating.
- (webworkerdaily.com 296 36 6 )
- [JAVASCRIPT] Learning JavaScript resources
- Good collection of tutorials and links about Javascript
- (juixe.com 289 4 6 )
- [CODE] Software Branching and Parallel Universes
- One of the best explanations of software branching in revision control that I’ve ever read.
- (codinghorror.com 274 34 3 )
- [GEEK] Flo Control Cat Door
- Image recognition to prevent cat from coming inside with a mouse. Why do I enjoy every link Coding Horror sends me so much?
- (quantumpicture.com 228 80 )
- [RAILS] Rails Rumble: 92 Web Apps Created in 48 Hours
- Winners from the 48 hours Rails Rumble
- (readwriteweb.com 169 28 681 )
- [FIREFOX] A Visual Guide to the Firefox Web Browser – Learn Firefox
- via: rooster
- (learnfirefox.cybernetnews.com 167 100 17 )
- [RAILS] Build Your Own Ruby on Rails Web Applications
- Free e-book for next 60 days. Probably not as good as Agile Web Development.
- (sitepoint.com 151 100 6 )
- [VIRUS] Gathering ‘Storm’ Superworm Poses Grave Threat to PC Nets
- Your antivirus software is completely useless. This is scary.
- (schneier.com 104 62 14 )
- [CODE] Inheritance is evil, and must be destroyed: part 1
- Using the strategy pattern vs inheritance with dark jedi examples.
- (berniecode.com 76 9 )
- [IPHONE] If wishes were iPhones, then beggars would call
- If you want to hack your phone (dvd player, etc) then buy a phone that lets you hack. Don’t complain about Apple’s lockin when everything they do revolves around lockin.
- (diveintomark.org 60 61 9 )
- [LIFEHACKS] 6 Rules for Dealing With Habits vs. Tasks
- Good ideas about how to build habits
- (zenhabits.net 54 8 58 )
- [BLOGGING] Blogging is Dumb, Stupid and Successful
- Rant against blogging about blogging and ‘quick tip’ type posts.
- (cornwallseo.com 38 25 716 )
- [CODE] What I Learned From X That Made Me A Better Programmer In Y
- From the article: ” We go with Bob’s plan because Bob successfully asserted his dominance over Fred. If we’re lucky, Bob is good at making plans as well as asserting dominance, but if he’s bad at making plans but good at asserting dominance, his plan is still the plan”
- (gilesbowkett.blogspot.com 37 3 2 )
- [HUMOR] Microsoft Search
- Microsoft Press releases shows that Microsoft Live Search will finally read the state Yahoo/Google was in 7 years ago.
- (wdr1.com 25 11 )
- [LIFEHACKS] shoutingmat.ch (lifehack)
- Interesting agreggator for posts about lifehacks.
- (lifehack.shoutingmat.ch 22 10 )
- [SEO] SEOS : The Card Counters of the Internet
- From the article: ” “Google is a casino, and you are a visitor.””
- (johnon.com 19 24 19 )
- [HUMOR] Crackbook
- Facebook parody site.
- (theinternetnowinhandybookform.com 16 17 )
- [BLOGGING] The 7 Habits of Highly Defective Bloggers
- 7 habits inverted with a view on blogging — what not to do
- (lifetrainingonline.com 12 6 13 )
- [PRESENTATIONS] Keynote (The Software) Considered Harmful
- Do presentations and demos with nothing but a whiteboard. Much more interactive.
- (gilesbowkett.blogspot.com 9 )
- [SEO] How I reversed my Google ranking penalty
- More on how asking for links with specific anchor text can get your blog blacklisted by google. Contest bloggers be aware.
- (davidairey.com 6 15 14 )
- [HUMOR] 300: The Board Game
- I still enjoy the meme :)
- (defectiveyeti.com 5 4 )
- [GUESTBLOGGING] Get Your Guest-Posts Here
- Guestblogger for hire, Chris G.
- (chrisg.com 3 18 )
- [COPYRIGHT] Has And Belongs To Many: The Problem With Trademarking Rails
- From the article: ” Trademark rights are destructive to the cooperation and trust necessary for successful open source projects.”
- (gilesbowkett.blogspot.com 2 )
- [RUBY] When does ( ?? == 63 ) ?
- True dat. Successfully scared me away from Ruby :)
- (sob.apotheon.org)
- [SEO] A Google Allegory at Hamlet Batista dot Com
- Asking for links with specific anchor text can get your blog blacklisted by google. Contest bloggers be aware.
- (hamletbatista.com 8 )
- [COMMUNITY] Poisonous People
- OSCON PDF slides from the SubVersion guys. Read the poisonous people one!
- (red-bean.com 5 )
Legend
- saves – number of people who bookmarked on http://del.icio.us
- inbound links – number of blogs who linked to it (max 100)
- diggs – number of people who dugg on http://digg.com
This Week at Internet Duct Tape
- Distraction Free GTD: 32 Todo List Web Applications
- Web Runner is a tiny site-specific web application that runs using less resources than Firefox or Internet Explorer. The whole idea behind a site specific web browser is that you want to access a web application without being tempted to access other sites. You want to access a site without being…
- Magazine Review: October 2007 Issue of Inc. Magazine
- I came to a rather startling discovery in the past month: magazines are just blogs with the added luxury of being able to read them while on the toilet or in the bathtub (but hopefully not both). I picked up the October issue of Inc. magazine because Joel Spolsky of Joel On Software has joined the…
- Blog Tip: Create a Link Post in 3 Seconds
- One question I’m frequently asked is “how do you build those Best of Feeds weekly links?” The way I do it is pretty complicated, but I’ve found a much simpler way that I want to share with you all.
- Digest for September 2007
- Every month I publish a digest post collecting the best of Internet Duct Tape.
- Best of Feeds – 30 links – programming, productivity, code, socialsoftware, socialnetworking
- Tags: adsense, advice, blogging, career, code, design, development, firefox, gtd, lifehacks, productivity, programming, ruby, rubyonrails, socialnetworking, socialsoftware, tips, web2.0, webdesign
This Week at IDT Labs
- [AKISMET] Akismet Auntie Spam v2.04
- Our favorite Auntie has a new version. 2007/10/04 version 2.04 – Fixed (some) memory problems with v2.03 – Still slow, I need to get it working with a profiler, none of the hacks for Greasemonkey + Firebug seem to work.
- [DELICIOUS] Delicious Link Builder
- Build a list of links using your delicious account to bookmark them. Works great with my Yahoo Pipe Cleaner script . Example : [BOOKMARKING] toread – an email-based bookmark service Simple service to use to track stuff ‘to read later’. They store the top 10 for each day. It’s like…
- [RSS PIPE] Stupid Credit Builder
- This is a clone of Stupid Feed Rewriter that backdates the entry to January 1st, 1970. Useful for adding a credit link at the end of a list.
Tags: blogging, estimation, free, funny, google, gtd, javascript, lifehacks, productivity, programming, rails, ruby, rubyonrails, search, seo, tips
7 Tips for Learning the Declutter Habit
The roots of clutter come from the same social forces that said collecting comic books and stamps were an “investment”. I don’t know if it comes from corporate greed or from a post-World-War-2 generation where things were so scarce that suddenly everything had value and hoarding became a way of life. But collecting for the sake of collecting is a life habit that you have to break before you find yourself retired and living as a shut-in because cardboard boxes are blocking your doors.
Why declutter? It frees up your house and it frees up your mind. Your possessions own you as anyone who has ever had to move repeatedly over the course of several years can attest. It was moving twice in one year that finally got me to get rid of CDs I no longer listened to and textbooks I hadn’t looked at since university.
Tip #1: Your material goods hold little resale value no matter what you paid for them. This is a hard lesson to come to terms with because you know how much you paid for something. It is particularly hard for electronic goods since they are so costly upfront but become obsolete so fast. Good luck re-selling your bulky CRT monitor set in the age of LCD.
The media format wars means that even if you build up a VHS, DVD, CD, vinyl or cassette tape collection then it will be obsolete in ten years and within twenty years you won’t even own a device that can play them back. Does your new computer have a 3’5″ floppy drive? Changing media formats mean that owning a media collection for the sake of collecting is a useless endeavor.
Tip #2: Digitization is your friend. Photos, music, TV shows and movies can all be stored compactly on your computer hard drive or on DVDs. Have a good backup strategy though because hard drives will eventually fail on you.
Tip #3: “Have I used this in the past year?” is the question to ask when it comes to clothes, shoes, kitchen appliances, all that stuff in the garage or the work shed. Only keep what you really have use for. Your brain plays tricks on you like telling yourself you can lose that 20 lbs in only a few months.
Tip #4: “Will I watch or read this again?” is what should go through your head when it comes to book or movie collections. Lifetime collections should consist of only the favorites you will re-watch or want to share with others, everything else is collecting dust.
Tip #5: Don’t be overly sentimental! When I was 9 years old I convinced my parents to haul a lobster trap back home with us from our summer vacation. It sat in the back of the yard falling apart for years if not decades. Did it inspire any memories of the trip? Not anymore than the easily portable and easily storable photos we had taken with it. Sentimental is keeping things that have special meaning to you — not keeping everything you’ve ever come in contact with.
Tip #6: Renting is more economical than owning. It might not be true when it comes to real estate but it’s definitely true when it comes to books, dvds and any other form of media. Libraries are free. A $6 rental fee is still much cheaper than $25 new or $11 in the bargain bin. Even if it the movie or book is worth becoming part of your lifetime collection then you are still ahead because of all the times when it wasn’t.
Tip #7: Find your downstream ecosystem. When I declutter my only concern is passing things on to someone who will make use of them. It would be nice to recoup some of the cost but the sad fact is most things lose value so fast these days that the effort to regain any of the initial value is wasted.
For small items there are sites like Amazon, Ebay and specialty sites. For large items there are local listings on Facebook and Craigslist. Clothes can go to second hand stores and the Salvation Army. Childrens books and stuffed animals are well appreciated by schools. Local libraries accept books, CDs and DVDs which they then resell to raise funds. With a little digging you can find a non-profit organization that refurbishes computers for underprivileged youth.
The secret to learning how to live a clutter-free life is to realize that items don’t hold their value, that economically renting is cheaper in the long term for single-use goods, and to know how to get rid of stuff in a way that it doesn’t go to waste.
Best of Feeds – 22 links – programming, blogging, tips, javascript, rails
RSS feeds are like cookies (that are good enough for me). Best of Feeds is a weekly collection of the best stuff I saw on the Internet this week. They’re saved on delicious and stumbleupon and cross-posted to Twitter and Tumblr as they happen and then collected together on Saturdays. I don’t blog on the weekend so read these links instead.
Subscribe to //engtech to see this every week (or get it by email).
- [GTD] Tracks
- A Ruby on Rails web app that is multiplatform and ships with it’s own web server (if needed). Implements GTD.
- (rousette.org.uk 3630 100 2 )
- [CREATIVITY] how to be creative
- From the article: ” Don’t try to stand out from the crowd; avoid crowds altogether.”
- (gapingvoid.com 3159 100 )
- [DESIGN] 15 Excellent Examples of Web Typography. Part 1
- 15 screenshots and links
- (ilovetypography.com 947 68 1624 )
- [GEEK] Cory Doctorow imagines a world in which Google is evil
- Cory Doctorow short story.
- (radaronline.com 374 100 22 )
- [HUMOR] lolsecretz – LOLCATS + POSTSECRET OMG!!!!!!!
- My memes have met and multiplied.
- (lolsecretz.blogspot.com 311 100 17 )
- [GEEK] How History Repeats Itself and the Death of Gmail
- Joel recounts the death of Lotus 1-2-3 in modern terms and explains how Google and current AJAX apps will die when they don’t realize the changing SDK.
- (joelonsoftware.com 270 100 11 )
- [CODE] 7 reasons I switched back to PHP after 2 years on Rails
- Interesting take: your new code is better because your a better programmer, not because it’s a better language.
- (oreillynet.com 259 26 30 )
- [JAVASCRIPT] Code Conventions for the JavaScript Programming Language
- Good to know for writing Greasemonkey scripts.
- (javascript.crockford.com 259 24 7 )
- [INTERVIEWS] Thirteen Patterns Of Programmer Interviews
- Humorous but very on-point. I wonder what the style of interviewing you perform says about your company?
- (typicalprogrammer.com 221 15 5 )
- [WORKHACKS] Secrets to Amazon’s success
- From the article: ” People’s side projects, the one’s they follow because they are interested, are often ones where you get the most value and innovation. Never underestimate the power of wandering where you are most interested.”
- (37signals.com 176 26 3 )
- [CODE] Everything Is Fast For Small n
- Good overview of computational complexity and why you should always test with large datasets (on slow computers :) )
- (codinghorror.com 165 10 )
- [FIREFOX] Top 10 Firefox Extension-free Tabbed Browsing Techniques
- Things you didn’t know how to do with Firefox tabs.
- (lifehacker.com 83 )
- [EMAIL] Save Time With Search Folders in Outlook
- Use search folders to organize your email instead of putting them in different folders
- (howtogeek.com 42 4 )
- [SMO] Stumbleupon mathematics for stumblers
- A very interesting hypothesis about how StumbleUpon decides how much traffic to send to a site.
- (ventureskills.wordpress.com 40 19 5 )
- [EFFICIENCY] Time Saving & Automation Round-up: Let the Computer Do the Work
- Get your computer to do the heavy lifting. I can’t spell.
- (ofzenandcomputing.com 30 2 8 )
- [SMO] The Secret to Massive Digg/StumbleUpon Traffic Without Spamming
- When someone promotes your post via a social media site, SAY THANK YOU and build a relationship with them.
- (successful-blog.com 26 16 75 )
- [BOOKS] Author Robert Jordan Dies
- Robert Jordan dies at 58 of a rare blood disease. Wheel of Times books left uncompleted.
- (ap.google.com 8 100 10 )
- [BLOGGING] 4 reasons to write on the weekend and 4 posts to do it with
- Mu argues against taking the weekend off from blogging
- (muhammadsaleem.com 5 6 51 )
- [LIFEHACKS] Nurture Your Relationships with Positive Flooding
- You need 5 positive actions for every 1 negative action in marriages, 3:1 for work
- (annezelenka.com 5 3 )
- [PRIVACY] A Question of Privacy
- Good overview of online privacy, data retention, cross-referencing, etc.
- (baekdal.com 5 )
- [BLOGS] Copyright Notice
- Finally a decent copyright notice for blogs! I’m going to copy it without giving any credit back.
- (angryaussie.wordpress.com 2 )
- [TV] 5 Questions Season Two of Heroes Had Better F#@king Answer
- Great wrap up of Season 1 of Heroes.
- (cracked.com 100 )
Legend
- saves – number of people who bookmarked on http://del.icio.us
- inbound links – number of blogs who linked to it (max 100)
- diggs – number of people who dugg on http://digg.com
This Week at Internet Duct Tape
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9 Techniques to Promoting Your Social Web Application
How do you build a web app that has traction, gain users and hopefully explodes virally? I’ve been paying attention to this space for far too long and this is a round-up of the tricks and techniques successful and not-so-successful social web applications use to promote themselves.
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The Problem With Social Web Applications
This is an exciting time because unlike traditional software that runs on your computer [1], web applications are created as social software where you have a friends list, collaborate on a document with multiple people and it is easily to share information and communicate. The downside is these…
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Best of Feeds – 55 links – programming, firefox, blogging, tips, lifehacks
Tags: blogging, books, business, debugging, del.icio.us, delicious, development, digg, facebook, firefox, funny, games, geek, humor, life, lifehacks, management, organization, productivity, programming, security, smo, socialbookmarking, socialnetworking, socialsoftware, stumbleupon, tips, video
This Week at IDT Labs
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[DELICIOUS/STUMBLEUPON] Delicious Stumbles crossposting tool
Last Greasemonkey script this week :) With Delicious Stumbles I get all of the super-useful features I like about delicious (speed, recommended tags) but I also teach StumbleUpon more about what I like without having to spend all that time cutting-and-pasting between two accounts. Submit a page…
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[WORDPRESS] Comment Ninja
My WordPress Comment Ninja extension is available for beta test. Try it out and let me know what you think! Respond directly from the comment administration panel on your dashboard Respond by comment, email or both (without having to cut-and-paste your response!) Respond using your email…
Tags: blogging, inspiration, javascript, lifehacks, productivity, programming, rails, strategy, stumbleupon, tips
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