One minute videos on digital transformation
One minute videos on digital transformation
I’ve been dying to work on some project while on paternity leave. (Yeah, yeah, I know!) Small videos are a good project. I don’t like short videos, but the whole rest of the world seems too. Plus, they’re faster to make than long ones. I’ve made four so far. They’re fun!
The videos are just anecdotes and small bits from the books I have. The idea, of course, is to get you, people, to download the books for more.
I’ve filmed the footage for two more.
Original programming
Podcasts:
- Software Defined Talk #230 - Who is Travis Scott?: On this week’s episode: Andreessen says it’s time build, Verizon buys Bluejeans, Splunk maybe watching and Google is giving Istio to a foundation. Plus, we offer informed opinions on Travis Scott and Fortnite.
- Drunk & Retired #201 - dot files, Mukbang, and Tom Nook: Managing configuration, watching people eat, app launcher, animal crossing, and vim jokes.
Once I edit it, this week’s Drunk and Retired episode will be out. If you like the rest of my podcasts, you’ll like this one: it’s lots of “tech life” and little tactics and tricks and tips kind of stuff with a rotating set of co-hosts. Subscribe now!
Garbage Chairs of Amsterdam.
While it’s not next to the garbage bins, it looks like it’s well on it’s way. Or will they fix it? A bench like this is a nice asset to have in front of your house. Once the sun comes out, you can get a little table and spend all afternoon out there with a bottle of wine, some little snacks (meatballs, cheese, quiche, strawberries) talking with friends and neighbors that go by. You usually chain these things up with old bike locks - which makes me wonder: who would steal a bench?
Maybe with a few nails and some slats of wood you could have that afternoon. If not, drag it to the garbage.
Also, see a video I made on a garbage chair.
Books
- Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst - a book about anger, a large book. While scientific, the author’s style is conversation - he talks of shit storms! - in a very blogging kind of way.
Listening
You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing and Why It Matters
This book is more about persuading you that you should listen, not how to listen. All too common books like this.
Another thing I can’t get a handle on is when it’s good to talk instead of listen. When can you be the one who’s being so studiously listened to? Much of the book - all? - is about quelling you urge to talk and listen. The wrap-chapter references work and interviews where people regretting talking, talking too much.
But, all these people you’re listening to: why do they get to talk?
Woke Lovecraft
“‘The blood-dimmed tide is loosed’!” The voice is positively gleeful now.“‘ And everywhere / The ceremony of innocence is drowned…’ Ah, that’s my favorite line. Gets right at the shallow performativity of so many things, don’t you think? Innocence is nothing but a ceremony, after all. So strange that you people venerate it the way you do. What other world celebrates not knowing anything about how life really works?” A soft laugh-sigh. “How your species managed to get this far, I will never know.”
— The City We Became, N. K. Jemisin
Relative to your interests
To see these links daily, as I find them, checkout my blog at cote.io.
- Street names - ‘Memorialising the past is just another way of wishing about the present. The trouble is that we don’t always share the same memories. And not everyone has an equal opportunity to enshrine their group’s memory on the landscape. ‘
- Commercial Ubuntu - ‘In the first nine months of Canonical’s 2019 fiscal year, the company had $83.43-million in gross revenue with $10.85-million in profits. A closer look reveals that Canonical has been profitable since 2018. ‘
- COBAL is just fine - ‘“Cobol isn’t cool, but businesses don’t care about what’s cool,” Klinect says. “They care about what works.”
- People focus on the trivial because it’s comfortable - ‘The Law of Triviality states that the amount of time spent discussing an issue in an organization is inversely correlated to its actual importance in the scheme of things. Major, complex issues get the least discussion while simple, minor ones get the most discussion.’ This concept as a tool is about learning how to place value in a task. Your tendency will be to solve problems that you understand, that seem easy to solve. Sometimes those are important, sometimes harder tasks are important. You have to know which outcome is better, what you want. Of course, it goes the other way too: just because a task is difficult or confusing doesn’t mean it’s valuable.
- Americans probably aren’t as crazy as they appear - ‘Two-thirds of registered Texas voters agree with decisions by Gov. Greg Abbott and several local officials to suspend nonessential business operations. And more than three-quarters of voters support orders to stay home except for essential activities. The poll’s findings come as Abbott says he will soon announce plans to reopen a wide range of Texas businesses.’
- Finding all the scenarios to try to pick one - ‘“We must first discover what we judge as possible, before we make judgements about what is desirable.”
- Not just efficient - ‘“In other words, efficiency is the sole concern in the design of algorithms. (Of course, the algorithm has to meet its intended functionality). What about resilience?”
- Less voices, better meetings - ‘The key is to recognize that the available input on an issue doesn’t all need considering. The most informed opinions are most relevant. This is one reason why big meetings with lots of people present, most of whom don’t need to be there, are such a waste of time in organizations. Everyone wants to participate, but not everyone has anything meaningful to contribute.’
- There’s always money in the identity management stand - ‘It’s reported that ForgeRock’s revenue has surpassed $100 million and its annual recurring revenue growth is 75%, a sign of customer satisfaction and strong demand. Today more than 1,100 organisations use the ForgeRock Identity Platform.’
- Verified advertising - ‘’
- Creating and gardening your personal brand - ‘Building a reputation or brand is hard. Sustaining it over time is extremely hard. As my colleague Coté told me, you have to “show up a lot and for a long time.” It takes intentional planning, and ongoing effort. It’s hard to just stumble into a durable personal brand. You need to make conscious choices. Worth it? I think so. In no particular order, here’s what I’ve learned about building and sustaining personal brands.’
- Consumer tech for the enterprise, enterprise tech for the consumer - ‘’Google can “appreciate the unique opportunity…to not be conflicted by our role as both a consumer and an enterprise company [and] not even bother with those distinctions” and focus on making products that people want to use’‘
- Simple recipes with common pantry items - there’s lots of noddle, but these all look really easy and good. Plus, most don’t require exotic ingredients or long cooking times.
- B2B content marketing - ‘PDF is not dead: 50% of technology purchase decision makers say they still prefer to download and read or print static articles.’