For episode 75 of The B&B Podcast Ben and I announce a new format and schedule to the show. You can listen for the details, but the gist of it is that we’re aiming for a 30-minute show and are moving away from talking about current events each week and will instead be focusing on more “timeless” topics. Of course, this week, the Amazon press event was happening live as we were recording and so naturally we talked about the just-announced Kindles. We also did some follow-up to last week’s discussion of App.net, and I talked about why my 23-inch Apple Cinema Display is about to get replaced by a grey market IPS display from Korea.

If you’ve got a product, service, job, or business you’d like to promote to our live audience and our weekly listeners, please send an email to Ben. With the new show format sponsors will get two mentions: once at the very beginning, and once again at the close. Also, you get a link right here each week when Ben and I link to the episode from our sites.

The new Paperwhite Kindle looks to be better than the old model in just about every way. I just ordered the Wi-Fi version.

Last year I bought a Kindle touch, and it was my first Kindle. I love it. But I mostly only use it on weekends and vacations because a good chunk of the book reading I do on a daily basis is at night before going to bed. And so I use my iPad a lot simply because I have to if I want to read in the dark. I’m definitely looking forward to using this new Kindle instead. Not only is the light going to be great, but the new Paperwhite display and the higher DPI makes it an overall more superior device than my current Kindle Touch.

If you’re also ordering a Paperwhite Kindle — or one of the new Kindle Fire HDs — then use these links and I’ll get a small kickback from Amazon. Thanks.

The glance at the new Kindle touch — which which Amazon themselves leaked in their commercial during last night’s game — looks great.

Nice work from the MacStories team.

Love this answer from Aaron Bleyart, one of the members of Team Coco, to what his dream setup would be:

My dream setup is exactly what I have now: A tremendous group of smart, funny, creative, good looking, talented people. I could always use a better lighting kit, a more expensive lens, more sensitive mics, etc, but all the hardware and software in the world is completely useless without a killer team of people to use it.

Harry McCracken:

I’m pretty sure it’s not just journalists who are using iPads as computers. I see people doing it in airplanes. I’ve seen them doing it on the subway. When I’m out and about, strangers run up to ask me about my keyboard. Something’s happening here, and it’s happening quickly — and so I thought I’d update you on my experiences as of the one-year mark.

John Moltz:

Others have noted this, but it certainly is shaping up to be the biggest fall in quite some time.

When I was a kid and I’d talk about the latest and greatest things coming out that we could buy, my dad would always say the same thing — “Save your money.” — and it would drive me bonkers. Dad, don’t you know I make like $1 a week allowance?

Continuing on with the subject of doing things differently than most people, here’s Seth Godin regarding how he spends his time:

I guess you make decisions about how you want to spend your time. What you didn’t mention is that I’m America’s worst watcher of television, cause I don’t spend any time doing that, zero. And I’m America’s worst attender of meetings, cause I don’t do any of that, zero. So I know people who do five hours of each every day. So right there I save myself ten hours a day. […]

So I try to sort of strike this balance between doing some things at an insanely quick, prolific rate and doing other things not at all.

The whole interview great; highly recommended reading.

On the subject of doing things differently than most people, here’s Jason Fried regarding the slash-and-burn mentality in the tech world:

I think all you have to do is read TechCrunch. Look at what the top stories are, and they’re all about raising money, how many employees they have, and these are metrics that don’t matter. What matters is: Are you profitable? Are you building something great? Are you taking care of your people? Are you treating your customers well? In the coverage of our industry as a whole, you’ll rarely see stories about treating customers well, about people building a sustainable business. TechCrunch to me is the great place to look to see the sickness in our industry right now.

Relatedly, you have read Rework, right?

My thanks to Harvest for sponsoring the RSS feed again.

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Sponsorship by The Syndicate

Ben and I are back after a 2-week hiatus caused by last-minute scheduling conflicts twice in a row (sorry about that). This week we talk about touchscreen desktop computers, Twitter, App.net, and Glassboard, and even the kitchen sink.

Sebastiaan de With showcases laptop design before and after the unibody MacBook Pro and MacBook Air.

And since Sebastiaan posted this, Samsung has announced their Series 5 and 7 Slates, which looks a whole lot like a MacBook Air.

And oldie and a goodie from Michael Lopp:

Stop reading right now and take a look at your desktop. How many things are you doing right now in addition to reading this column? Me, I’ve got a terminal session open to a chat room, I’m listening to music, I’ve got Safari open with three tabs open where I’m watching Blogshares, tinkering with a web site, and looking at weekend movie returns. Not done yet. I’ve got iChat open, ESPN.COM is downloading sports new trailers in the background, and I’ve got two notepads open where I’m capturing random thoughts for later integration into various to do lists. Oh yeah, I’m writing this column, as well.

Folks, this isn’t multi-tasking. This is advanced case of Nerd Attention Deficiency Disorder.

Rowan Pelling takes a look at procrastination:

Procrastinators are less wealthy, less healthy and less happy than those who don’t delay.

(Via today’s edition of The Next Draft.)