eno #9

Nice read at FastCompany. But at what point does the fact that a CEO kayaks no longer seperate him/her from all the other CEO’s? It strikes me as funny seeing that in the first paragraph of any article about any CEO the author needs to tell us that a CEO is actually human, ‘ you know, he breathes oxygen too!’

I read a lot of articles about CEO’s and according to my unscientfic research all CEO’s must do one of the following to appear different from their CEO counter parts;
-Rock Climb
-Compete in Triatholons
-Run Marathons
-Hunt wild game
-Mountain Bike/Cycle
-Big Game Hunting

What P&G Knows About the Power of Design

Interesting read. I like the approach from a developers stand point. Every time someone accesses your application/site they need to have a positive expereince.

Mai-lan’s Visio Blog : Visio Use at Microsoft: Vaca Bubble Chart for Revenue Reporting

This is great. A panaroma view of all the levels in Super Mario Brothers!  How awesome. Nintendo should print these on some high quality paper and sell them as retro art.

Level 1-1

Level 1-4

Props to A Gonzo Journal » Super Mario Bros Mapped Out

RadioHead Blog…These guys rock.
DEAD AIR SPACE

I f I could design one site it would be Radiohead.com What a site!

Props to A Gonzo Journal » Quit Complaining About Your Job a new fav of mine.

U.S. Supreme Court rejects RIM’s appeal | CNET News.com

This is not good mainly because it impacts me. If I hadn’t just purchased a Blackberry I would be sitting on the sidelines laughing it up. But I did purchase a Blackberry. On one hand I want to say who cares about it, let RIM get away with it. But, if they broke the rules and are making money of anothers hard work, well I guess I and millions of others will have to grin and bear it. I guess I am old fashioned that way.  I afterall still pay for music.

RIM is stating that they have a workaround……yeah…thats gonna go over like a lead ballon. Zeppelin anyone?

Slashdot | Yahoo! Yields Search Dominance to Google
My first reaction to the news that Yahoo is claiming defeat was to rip the boys and girls at Yahoo a new one. But in all honesty they are whooped. They have two options, continue getting it handed to them or give up and focus on a strength. After reviewing the situation I cannot say I blame them. However being a red blooded American, giving up is just hard to swallow. Perhaps Yahoo is giving up on search as we know it. Maybe they refocus that energy on Yahoo 360 and redefine the space of search.  It’s possible. After all that is what Google did to the big portals to get where they are today.

The race for search is far from over. Not sure how many years down the road it will change, but at some point, perhaps a small start up will invent something that we needed all along but just didnt know it ydet, perhaps that company is alreay out there.

Nothing worse than sitting at a demo and having the presnter spend the first 15 minutes gabbing about the inspiration of the product. I know this doesn’t work due to the fact that I love to gab about ‘inspiration’. As Guy so aptly points out, hit them with the shock & awe, or as he puts it ‘Do the last thing first.’ Afterall thats why they/we are sitting in the room in the first place. What the heck does your demo do for me? Then follow it up with the how, I would be careful with the ‘How’. It all depends on your audience. For example a techie crowd wants the how, and executive crowd would lean towards the ‘How Much’ is this going to cost.

Let the Good Times Roll by Guy Kawasaki: How to Be a Demo God

A few people (Steve Jobs to name one) suggest altered states to help one innovate.  The critical issue here is that one does not have to resort to taking LSD to help them see a problem from a different pov.  Innovation is all about change, listen to different music, take a different way to work, read books watch tv shows do everything different from your routine. In essence get out of your rut!  Exposure to sources of information that are normally outside your realm of comfort will lead to innovation.

Productivity tip: Take more LSD?! – Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)
Wired News: LSD: The Geek’s Wonder Drug?

Deadbeat friends owe you money! Good news keep track of them with Bill Monk! Gerbs, I know you snaked my copy of the Starwberry Statement, you owe me!
BillMonk

When all is said and done everything is a design problem, it just depends what language you are speaking, ie accounting, knowledge management, IT, etc etc.

By the way Ideo rocks!

The Power of Design

As Ideo CEO Tim Brown puts it, “Where you innovate, how you innovate, and what you innovate are design problems”