Archive for the ‘Measuring’ Category
July 16th
I got these tips as an email forward, but they’re originally from a Best Life article by Alec Applebaum: 10 Ways to Save the World with Your Trash.
My favorite is number 2: “As part of its Reuse-A-Shoe program, Nike will take your old funky-smelling sneakers and turn the rubber, foam, and fabric into three types of Nike Grind—a major ingredient in synthetic surfaces such as basketball courts, tennis courts, running tracks, and playgrounds. Niketown stores and Nike factory outlets will accept any brand of athletic shoes as long as they are not wet, are not cleats, and don’t contain metal.”
Visit this website for more information. And don’t forget to read the other tips, too!
July 8th
Ribbon Farm is a blog about business & innovation.  Written by Venkatesh Rao, he often illustrates his ideas with whimsical and thoughtful drawings. He works at the Xerox Research Center, where his research is in the areas of the “Future of Documents” and “Future of Work.”
Here’s his illustration of the evolution of work-life balance patterns as shaped by changing cultural attitudes over the last century. 
June 30th
Has the Internet made us less attentive readers?
In this month’s Atlantic, Nicholas Carr admits he now has trouble reading books and longer magazine articles—thanks, he speculates, to the Internet’s way of turning us into superficial information grazers.
In Slate, Michael Agger describes some studies that show how lazy our brains are online: they prefer short sentences, explanatory headlines, and bulleted lists, and they skip large chunks of text.
Personally, I still have plenty of patience for reading books and magazine articles, but only when I’m offline, and only when I’m not anxious about some other time commitment. Online, however, I’m exactly like the rest of us, erratic, impatient, unable to concentrate on (too) much at one time…
I don’t know. When I need to do any sort of sustained writing or thinking, I try to close my Internet browser, though it isn’t always easy. Other times surfing the web is like keeping my eyes occupied while my mind searches for the right word or concept—sometimes I find that it helps, and other times I’m probably just kidding myself.
What do you think?
June 27th
Stewart Brand, author, visionary thinker, and environmentalist, wrote a book about a new form of human thinking about time and responsibility for the future.
The Clock of the Long Now: Time and Responsibility, introduces the “Clock of the Long Now Project“–a gigantic mechanical clock in the Nevada desert, as monumental as Stonehenge, and engineered to record time over 10,000 years.
In concise essays, Brand touches on the mathematics and philosophies of time, episodes of history, and arguments for stretching out our perceptions of time, the benefits of long-term thinking, reversing our shorter and shorter attention spans.
The idea to build a momument scale, multi-millennial, all mechanical clock as an icon to long term thinking came from computer scientist Danny Hillis. 
Brian Eno, a board member of the Long Now Foundation, described their mission: “The idea is to extend our concept of the present in both directions, making the present longer…Civiliations with long nows look after things better. In those places you feel a very strong but flexible structure which is built to absorb shocks and in fact incorporate them.”
June 23rd
In a recent review of our Texagenda planner, a reader from Des Moines, IA, wrote:
“I think it is unfortunate that you do NOT carry the refills at Barnes and Noble, where I purchased my textagenda. If I buy the refill online, it will cost me $4 more than buying a brand new cover AND planner at Barnes & Noble.”
To clear up any confusion, let me first explain that it’s Barnes & Noble who chooses which products they carry—not us. (If it were up to us, they would carry everything we sell!) If you shop there, and you don’t see what you’re looking for, you can always try asking the customer service department.
Secondly, we do take pricing seriously when it comes to our online vendors—though keep in mind that they shoulder an additional expense for the product’s shipping and handling. Nonetheless, we’re going to talk around and investigate rates and carriers…
June 19th
“Packed Calendars Rule Over Executives” was the subject of Carol Hymowitz’s “In the Lead” column in the Wall Street Journal this week. Several executives, including Daniel Vasella, CEO of Novartis, share how they get free from a crammed agenda.
Vasella “keeps himself in check” by occasionally stepping back to evaluate his plans, questioning whether he could do his job differently.
Mark Hurd, CEO of Hewlett-Packard, makes sure he has some breathing space on his calendar. He leaves time every day for things that just come up.
Kathleen Murphy, CEO of ING US Wealth Management, believes that the single most crucial element for surviving a packed schedule is to have a competent team to which you can delegate important jobs.
“At my level you can’t get caught in the weeds,” she says, “you have to move back to a more strategic position.”
May 13th
This morning at Slate, the editors tackle a topic that’s near to everyone’s hearts with a special report on procrastination. (Of course I read the whole thing before I started composing this post.)
My favorite piece: Emily Yoffe’s tale about trying to use online support groups and self-help books to stop procrastinating. Yoffe sounds like a woman after my own heart; “For me,” she writes, “Small tasks—getting the dry cleaning, checking the downspouts—have a way of inflating like helium, floating the day away.” Here’s her attempt to understand the psychology of procrastination:
Joseph Ferrari, a professor of psychology at DePaul University… divides us into two general behavior types: arousal procrastinators and avoidance procrastinators. Arousal procrastinators seek the excitement and pumping stress hormones of having to finish everything under duress. (I’m this type.) Avoidance procrastinators make their work the measure of their self-worth and so end up putting it off out of fear. (I’m this type, too.) I talked to Ferrari and discovered that after 20 years of studying us, his sympathy is wearing thin. “I don’t understand this, why they’re consistently like this. I don’t like cutting the grass, but I do it.”
In the end, the best advice comes from her 12-year-old daughter—stop taking so many breaks, and stop making excuses for yourself. Easier said than done, of course, but never mind…
April 22nd
Author Michael Pollan wrote an article in last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine about why, given the immensity of the problem we face in global warming and the improbability that any one individual act (or even lifestyle) is going to make an impact, we should bother doing things like switching to CFL light bulbs or biking, not driving, to work:
If you do bother, you will set an example for other people. If enough other people bother, each one influencing yet another in a chain reaction of behavioral change, markets for all manner of green products and alternative technologies will prosper and expand. (Just look at the market for hybrid cars.) Consciousness will be raised, perhaps even changed: new moral imperatives and new taboos might take root in the culture… And those who did change the way they live would acquire the moral standing to demand changes in behavior from others—from other people, other corporations, even other countries.
Idealistic and even naïve as that may be, it seems like justification enough to change one’s ways. But it also got me thinking about how trendy “going green” has become, and how conflicted I remain about it. On the one hand, it’s great to see companies like Whole Foods and even Wal-Mart announce initiatives to eliminate plastic bags or reduce the amount of mercury in CFLs. Their motives aren’t pure, but the outcome is still good, and the impact is far greater than any individual could hope to accomplish. On the other hand, if the trend ever dies, then we’re back to where we started. And it’s ridiculous, almost dangerous, to give people the idea that they can save the earth by buying stuff.
Also, environmentalism has long felt like an essentially personal choice, where we decide to sacrifice our own convenience for a cause that we believe in, because our ethics and our sense of individual responsibility demand it. It’s hard to reconcile that view with a cynical, herd-following mentality. Many companies struggle, too—and I know this is a corporate blog—but a lot of us care passionately about preserving the environment, and would be quite distressed if people thought it was just another marketing ploy.
What do you think?
March 24th
Until it was mentioned in yesterday’s Times, I never realized that Good Friday marks the official birthday of the peace sign. Gerald Holtom, a designer from West London, came up with the now-famous symbol by combining letters from the semaphore, or flag-signalling, alphabet. An N stands for “nuclear”; a D for “disarmament”; and the circle around the two is meant to symbolize Earth.
The peace sign had its first official outing 50 years ago at a Good Friday demonstration in England that was organized by the Direct Action Committee Against Nuclear War and the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
March 7th
Here’s an email we recently received:
I have been a loyal customer for 10 years now. I am becoming more aware of the environmental issues relating to paper use and deforestation, and will be rethinking my purchase of next year’s planner if recycled (not “recyclable”) paper isn’t used in producing it. Please let me know your plans for moving to recycled paper. This would be a major selling point for many customers as well as likely to be highlighted in the media, so a win-win-win solution for the company, customers and our environment. Thank you.
– Emily S., Berkeley, CA
Thank you, Emily, for prodding us to include planners made entirely from recycled paper. This new line - “Equology” - will be available in the U.S. for the 2010 calendar year, possibly sooner.
But Emily, not all recycled paper is good for the environment. Actually, recycling papers can be very toxic when chemicals are used to de-ink the paper. There are a lot of questions we need to ask manufacturers of recycled paper products. It is not enough to say “recycled!”
Read the rest of this entry »
