Month: March 2011

When we Work and Play from the Same Device  →

Seth Godin:

More and more, we’re finding it easy to get engaged with activities that feel like work, but aren’t. I can appear just as engaged (and probably enjoy some of the same endorphins) when I beat someone in Words With Friends as I do when I’m writing the chapter for a new book. The challenge is that the pleasure from winning a game fades fast, but writing a book contributes to readers (and to me) for years to come.

One reason for this confusion is that we’re often using precisely the same device to do our work as we are to distract ourselves from our work. The distractions come along with the productivity. The boss (and even our honest selves) would probably freak out if we took hours of ping pong breaks while at the office, but spending the same amount of time engaged with others online is easier to rationalize.

Seth proposes that we separate work devices from play devices.

It’s the exact same thing that Rick Stawarz wrote about a few days ago. He’s turning his iPad, iPhone, and MacBook into app-dedicated gadgets: iPhone for staying connected to work on the go, MacBook for doing work, iPad for play and leisure.

On my computer I do work email, personal email, website email; book-keeping and taxes and business-related tasks; reading; writing; project planning; task management; time management; research; and more…

It’s all done right here in one spot on one machine. It is certainly a distraction-prone environment — but it’s not just the bad distractions (like games or YouTube). It is so very easy to switch from work email to personal email back to work email all in the same sitting. But I don’t know if that is necessarily the best use of time.

I wrote about this somewhat last September when I wrote about how Inbox Zero is all about the outbox. I am always wanting to grow and excel in time management and living with focus, and this is something I’d very much like to write about and explore even more in the future.

When we Work and Play from the Same Device

My Growing To-Do List for shawnblanc.net Beginning April 4

  • Write a review of LaunchBar
  • Re-evaluate my approach to time management and how I get things done to best fit my new schedule and work flow
  • Slightly refresh and update this site’s design and completely re-code the WordPress theme from scratch for better load times and valid HTML
  • Write about the differences between how I use and approach Simplenote and Yojimbo
  • Finish that review of Instapaper I started last Summer
  • Write a review about the SSD I put in last Fall
  • Begin asking folks for their participation in a new minimalistic interview series I am planning to launch
  • Begin working on a long-form interview with… (?)
  • Reply to the emails in my inbox from those who are interviewing me
  • Join the Mac Developer Program
  • Install [Redacted]
  • Join the iOS Developer Program
  • Begin work on Book Number One
  • Design a t-shirt or two
  • Remind everyone that memberships are still very much available and more awesome than ever
My Growing To-Do List for shawnblanc.net Beginning April 4

Go J Go  →

Stephen Hackett is selling some very fun shirts. 100% of the proceeds go directly to support St. Jude Children’s Hospital, which has been treating Stephen’s son, Josiah (a.k.a. “J”), since May 2009 for a brain tumor:

St. Jude treats patients without regard of their ability to pay. That’s pretty cool. To put this into perspective, Josiah’s medical bills — after just 6 months — totaled almost a million dollars. After a year, he was at just over $2 million. Just stop and think about that. It’s pretty mind-boggling. Needless to say, St. Jude is an unbelievable blessing to families with children affected by diseases like Josiah’s.

Stephen is a stand up guy and St. Jude is an incredible blessing. If you’re looking for a new, fun shirt to wear this summer, and want your proceeds to go directly to a good cause, pick up a “Go J Go” shirt. I did.

Go J Go

Felix Salmon on The New York Times’ Paywall  →

Felix Salmon:

The pricing structure is also a strong disincentive to use the iPad app at all, of course. If you’re already paying $15 every four weeks to have full access to the website, why on earth would you pay extra just to be able to read the paper on its own dedicated app rather than in Safari? I, for one, prefer the experience of reading nytimes.com on the web on my iPad, rather than reading an iPad app which has no search, no links, no archives, no social recommendations, etc etc. If the NYT wanted to kill any incentive to read and develop its iPad app, it’s going about it the right way.

Felix Salmon on The New York Times’ Paywall

[Sponsor] TrackTime  →

TrackTime enables Creatives and Web Professionals to identify and track lost billable hours. Unlike other timers TrackTime enables you to retrospectively assign billable hours from app usage, web history or iTunes history. TrackTime easily identifies ‘lost’ time by visualizing where you spend your time, allowing users to easily see for who and how their time is spent.

See how much time is really spent tweaking, updating or just doing that tiny quick fix, then bill for it.

shawnblanc.net readers can use the code SHAWNBLANC for 15% off until the 26th of March.

[Sponsor] TrackTime

Midori  →

Many, many thanks to Jitouch for sponsoring the RSS feed this week to promote Midori. Midori is a beautiful and powerful Japanese dictionary and translation app for iPhone and iPad. It has hundreds of thousands of entries, example sentences, and names to help you translate and learn Japanese.

Midori’s sponsorship was booked well before last week’s tsunami in Japan, but I can’t think of a more fitting app to be promoted on the RSS feed this week. And it’s worth noting that purchasing a copy of Midori means you’ll be directly supporting the work of a Japanese iOS developer.

You can pick it up for ten bucks as a universal app from the iTunes App Store.

Midori