Terry Gross, NPR - Fresh Air, Interview

Terry Gross, NPR/Fresh Air, interview w/Matt Richtel, NY Times Tech Ed., "Your Brain on Computers": MUST LISTEN. http://ow.ly/2u96h #n5com

BTR 10.23.09 - Leadership

From the perspective of history, comes this article, found in the stacks of Inc. magazine, comes a bit of a timely, useful and much needed shot of information. Dare I say it even contains a healthy dose of wisdom? Yes on both counts; I do and there is.

With the vantage of 2 years of hindsight, might we not learn from our recent history, that the following article has some real merit? It's workting for those who practice; it doesn't for those who don't. Can we not draw a clear conclusion? If not, what - other than ego - stands in the way of clarity..? I submit whatever it is should be removed before permanent damage results.

I _really_ suggest this be a slow and deliberate read. Re-read it - whether you think it's necessary or not. It is!

In Praise of Selflessness
Why the best leaders are servants

By Leigh Buchanan | May 1, 2007 Inc. Magazine

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20070501/managing-leadership.html

#btrcom

Posted via email from Beyond The Ripples

BTR 08.AUG.2009

'What's in a name?' 

A question asked many times by equally many pondering minds. Value. Honor. Family. Origin. Future. Regret. These and many more make up the sum of the names we carry; assigned or assumed. Writers, in many cases, write under 'assumed names' - referred to as PEN NAMES or in the French tongue, Nom de plume. A bit of a travel among the stacks of Wikipedia provided this tidbit on the art of writing under an assumed name.

In today's venue of communication offerings, eMAIL has grown to unimaginable levels in just the past 10 years. How we send these tiny digital bits of yak 'n frak, is as varied as the options offered in a Google on the subject. But another matter entirely arises when we decide the archival and recall of our online correspondence is important. There are a number of offerings; and I personally use more than one. Mostly because I am constantly kicking the .exe files to see what's new. And partly because I just haven't found that 'perfect' email reader/storage/recall tool.  

Maybe we have gotten a bit closer with the offering from a group called POSTBOX-INC.COM. PostBox-Inc.com is not a free tool, but neither is it cost prohibitive. At $30, if it works as well as it is promoted to, then it will be well worth it and well on its way to providing a more 'total solution' package. It's free to download. I have and will be testing it soon. But I still won't give up my Gmail accounts! Nope. I like and enjoy the versatility and access freedom far too much to look elsewhere... yet.

And with that I segue into the next item. As mentioned I use Gmail .. a LOT (> 45 accounts, presently! ... and I use them all day, by-the-minute!). With all those accounts and all that email: I also rarely delete any email deemed worthy of keeping: I obviously don't want to 'loose' my email. So, like all good computer technology practices DATA BACKUP is a 'good thing'. A REAL GOOD THING!!

I began looking for ways to gather groups of email within my various Gmail accounts and send them in .zip compressed files to people wanting such information. I have yet to find such a resolution (hint, hint! please let me know if you KNOW of such a tool or technique!) - but I did find a neat tool for backing up my Gmail email accounts. The took is called Gmail BACKUP - odd eh? - and is a 3rd party product produced by a couple of enterprising Czechs. I can't give a 'thumbs up or down' on this as I've not tried it yet. But it sure looks easy enough to execute. I will test and provide my findings in an 'update' - on this page - when I do.

While I'm on NEW STUFF ... Adobe^® has come out with a cool tool called the BrowserLab. It's essentially a browser testing tool - for your web designs - all under one FLASH roof. Actually this is a very welcome tool. I only took it for a quick turn around the block, but it sure did the trick on finding the kinks and offering solutions in a quick design. Not sure what ALL it will do, but knowing Adobe as well as I do! - they will have it tricked out and downright indispensable within couple of versions; if not sooner.

The good folks over at photo store'n'share giant, Flickr have come up with a very cool tool, currently in (Beta), called Flickroom [note the shared 'r' in the spelling!]. The idea here is to have a Lightroom-like viewing window in which to view all of your Flickr goodies ... and those of your Flickr associations; established or serendipitous! Flickroom is based upon the Adobe^® Air technology. Quite slick, but a bit slow on older machines [read: impossible!! FLASH 10 is NOT usable on OS X below 10.4 or Vista]. And now it's time for a bit of spawned btr editorial comment. Two (2) topics today...

[1] I am a web designer - have been for 15 years - and I really, no longer, design for legacy technology. I did this in my early years. Beat myself to death trying to make my web designs work for every platform. I stopped. It was not worth the effort. If you choose to design with cutting shelf technology, then do so without looking over your shoulder. But, if you must design looking back, then drop the box of goodies you just found in the latest-n-greatest what's-new-in-online-technology-bundle and stick to the basics of HTML and forget about 'cool' looking. Just the facts is all 'Joe Friday HTML' is looking for. This might grate in the craw of those who try to say we 'must' design for legacy data and those who are still 'behind' in their run-toward-technology. My response is still the same. I've not seen the data to support the so-called, lagging-element. What I do see is a lot of people who choose NOT to update - for whatever reason [most of it being 'fear-based' .. ie, primarily: fear of change]. But I don't see people still using WIN 98, NT or 2000 complaining their machines can't do ____ (fill-in-the-blank). The same goes for legacy users of Mac 9.0 or lower. By far, the majority of these users are not interested in updating. Thus they either are unaware of new offerings or just don't care. For them, their computer is an 'IBM selectric upgrade', nothing more. Fine. Let's understand this and move forward, NOT trying to drag the disinterested along and everyone else - including technology advancement - down.

[2] Flickroom DOES ask to have FULL, unfettered access, to your Flickr account; both public and private material. So, if you are not willing to have the items marked PRIVATE in your Flickr account, Go Public! - then I would say, 'steer clear of this tool opportunity'. I have nothing to hide in my data, but I do have a few Flickr sites for certain art and marketing projects that I use for 'private storage' and/or communication between a small group of specific colleagues. Thus the material is NOT for general (aka: Public!) consumption. That's why Flickr has the PRIVATE settings! However, if you activate this 3rd party extension, you will be negating the 'Private' portion of ANY Flickr account you give discovery access to this software. Flickroom is still a very cool tool, but this is something to be aware of.

OK. Peachbox Platform is ...OFF!

I love technology as much as the next nerd, but there is no replacement for running and romping outdoors, no matter what age you are. Kids need to get outside and play. I grew up on a small creek, surrounded by riparian buffers of old growth Hoosierland hardwoods. My playtime was spent amid trees, fish, tadpoles, mud and all the fun and mess that goes along with it. I would not trade that for anything. So the next item is near and dear to me and it was a wonderful serendipitous find. The folks over at GlobalFisher.com have teamed up with a design firm called RED DIRT and a very impressive gathering of outdoor artists (my friend Bob White of WhiteFishStudio.comis one!), to produce a great site for kids called Fishy Kid.

FishyKid is right down my aisle. It's about teaching kids the values of fishing, knowledge of the natural world, respect for environment and the lifelong values each of these areas bring to life. Do check it out and get you kids involved in the FishyKid Coloring Contest.

If you want to see the influence natural beauty has upon the life of the person who participates in such endeavors and for those influenced by such a person, then visit the site of Yoshikazu Fujioka called, Trouts and Seasons of a Mountain Village. Yoshi is an amazing artist and a wonderfully gentle man. I have no doubt anyone visiting this site will do as I did back in 1997 when I first stumbled upon it - just after Yoshi had first released his new web site. And like then, I find myself everynow and then re-entering this Japanese Brigadoon. Once again, being swept up in its magical mystery and then leaving it only to return by serendipitous encounter again a few years later.

This is why I love the act of serendipitous encounter. Why I write the Beyond The Ripples.

Until later ...

BTR

Posted via email from Beyond The Ripples' posterous

Thank You DAVE button ...

Finally someone has taken up the baton to give Dave Winer his due for being .. in my book at least .. THE DRIVING FORCE behind what we now know as Blogging, PodCasting and the tools that make them valuable: RSS and OPML.

I've known Dave since the early days of February 1995 when I stumbled upon his very first DaveNet. From that first open commentary I've been hooked. Not just on Dave as a pioneer .. but on the whole concept he showed us that could be done: Personal Journalism.

I'd been searching for two (2) things since 1970:

• Some way to live - as I put it - in Gofungobotswannaland (my name for anywhere-on-earth) - and be able to communicate with anyone else - anywhere on the planet - with text, images, video and audio.
• To have a universal platform for publishing both my textual and visual ideas, concepts and notions.

I discoverd my dream was shared by others far more capable of bringing it to a reality in 1990 ... and in 1994, it became the Internet. Then in February of 1995 I found DaveNet and realized I now had the 'potential for a full-house'. Since then I've been dealin' the 'cards' like a mad-man to get that hand.

I could say I 'followed' Dave since then - but, alas that would be inaccurate. I couldn't follow - for I was not able to fully comprehend the technology he was employing. So, I became a serious 'watcher/observer'. I attempted to employ Frontier .. but failed at it miserably. I lacked the skills to manage the server and scripting. But I was not deterred. I just kept watching, observing and plowing forward. Then came EditThisPage .. VOILA! I could do this.

I played with EditThisPage through a number of windows. I learned what could be done on a very personal level. But found it was missing the 'marketing tool' I knew it needed - but just did not know how to do it. I wanted to be able to 'sydicate' my writings through and to 'other publication'. But aside from getting people to make a 'link' to my work there was no way to actually 'publish through a marketing tool'. Then along came Radio.

At once I knew this would make a big change in how I and a lot of other folks would communicate. Boy, I didn't know just HOW MUCH of a change it WOULD make! Then when Dave brought RSS to the fore I knew then that I have access to the 'full-house hand'.

And since then it's been nothing short of sensational.

Yes .. there have been many others along the way who have added to the current bevy of choices. But the fact remains, had Dave Winer NOT taken the initiative and stepped-to-the-plate first .. then we would have had a different outcome. And for me, watching the run of this 'history maker' from the start, I doubt very seriously if anyone else would have done it any better ... or as good.

So I'm very pleased to prominently display my "THANKS DAVE" button. Use it to connect yourself with the voice of a pioneer. And from one who has been on the front-lines as a personally embedded observer ... don't believe the condescending descriptions of Dave. I find that most of those who are so free with using them, are merely overlaying their shortcomings onto what they 'perceive' is Daves.
Thanks again to Brian Bailey for starting this. And thanks to Dave Winer for making it possible for Brian and me and thousands of others to build this Ring of Thanks.

CiAS@BeyondTheRipples

Know Ripples, Know Change. No Ripples, No Change.

New Logo ..

Beyond The Ripples has a NEW Logo. Changing the templates is not too bad. You just have to be careful.

Cias@BeyondTheRipples

First Post of Beyond The Ripples .. Bogger Version

This is the first posting of my NEW Beyond the Ripples weblog. This is the 4th version of BTR that I've produced in the past 7 years. All 3 of the previous issues either crapped out from computer crashes and lack of backup or from blog software malfunction. Yeah, that's sort of like 'wardrobe malfunction' - the difference is we just know it's going to happen and live with the decimation that results.

I hope this platform will work better for me. I also have a new design for the site and hope I can successfuly adjust the Blogger templates to accomodate. We'll see.

OK that's it for now ...

talk again soon...


CiAS@BeyondTheRipples