The quote of the day:
“All power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The more I’ve learned, the less I believe it. Power doesn’t always corrupt. What power always does is reveal. When a guy gets into a position where he doesn’t have to worry anymore, then you see what he wanted to do all along.”
-Robert Caro, Interviewed in Esquire, 12/16/09
I’m speaking this month at the Puget Sound SIG-CHI meeting (1/26, 6:30pm, location TBD) , a cool group of designers, researchers and UX-minded folks.
Since it’d be daft to pick a topic without some form of user-research, I’m asking you, here and now, what you’d most like to have me talk about. Here are some suggestions:
If anything in the list resonates, leave a comment. Or offer a suggestion please. Thanks.
I met Joe Wikert, GM at O’Reilly Media, in 2008, while negotiating terms for Confessions of a Public Speaker. I’ve talked to many editors and executives at publishing companies, but he quickly charmed me with his genuine intelligence and honest good nature. Like my editor at O’Reilly, Mary Tressler, he’s one of my favorite people at O’Reilly Media.
When I decided to self-publish my newest book, Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds, many people assumed there was some bad blood between O’Reilly Media and myself. It was one of the most common questions I heard, despite it not being the case.
When Joe asked to interview me about self-publishing, I imediately said Yes, as this is exactly the kind of good natured curiosity, and interest in providing a level playing field, that made me happy to work with Joe and O’Reilly Media in the first place.
We talked about the choices I’ve made, what I learned, advice I have for authors and publishers, and more (here’s Wikerts summary).
Some folks at Pixar, like their President Ed Catmul, offer great and true insight into the creative process. Here’s Lasseter with an excellent quote:
“I will never let a story reel go into production without it being great… I can show you early versions of the Pixar films when they are terrible. Every Pixar film was the worst motion picture made at one time or another. People don’t believe that but it’s true. We don’t give up on the films… we work, and re-work these story reels and [only] then we go into production. We then do the staging with the camera work. We go and record the dialogue with the actors. We’ll do the animation. Meanwhile, all the things that have been modeled that’s in the set and the characters has to be colored, with texture, and then it’s brought together, and lit, and we do the final rendering… it’s a lengthy process. It’s hand made… it takes 4 years.”
John Lasseter, Chief Creative Officer at Pixar, on Charlie Rose, 12/5/11
“I don’t write to get something through to somebody. I write for various reasons. Some songs I write for the pleasure of writing the song. It doesn’t have any great meaning, it’s just a song. Songs are nice. Kids sing songs all the time for the pleasure of the singing. The pleasure of the rhythm. London bridge is falling down… There’s a pleasure in singing the songs, there is a pleasure in writing the songs. Some songs you try and express yourself emotionally. Those are different songs for me. And they express what I feel and they relieve tensions that I feel when I express them. But I don’t think about getting through to somebody.”
– Paul Simon (From “Songs of America” documentary)
Some of you know, in addition to my writing and speaking work, I work as a team lead for WordPress.com, managing a team of developers and designers. It’s an amazing place to work, and I’ve given a few talks about how we make design and engineering decisions.
You can read a popular post I wrote called How WordPress.com is made, which focuses on how our 100 person company works, even though we are distributed around the globe, all the time. You can also read Automattic CEO Toni Schnieder’s post In praise of Continuous Deployment, about how we deploy new features and code.
I gave a short lecture on how wp.com is made at WordCamp Seattle (an informal series of events around the world for people interested in WordPress) which you can watch below. When I gave this talk again in Portugal, someone from Corefactor made a sketchnote, documenting the core points I made.
Here’s the talk from Wordcamp Seattle:
If you get bored, skip to 18:30, where i talk about how we almost never use email. I talk about Jetpack at 23:00, and Q&A begins at about 31:00. If you have trouble with the embedded version, go here.
Here’s the quote of the day. I wish more stars in all workplaces felt this way (Although Kobe has plenty of history of being less than coachable):
“[Brown] was not afraid to criticize the star guard [Kobe Bryant] after the exhibition opener Monday against the Clippers, pointing out to reporters that Bryant was one of many Lakers whose defense was subpar.
Brown called a timeout less than a minute into the third quarter that night after Bryant left Clippers guard Chauncey Billups open for a three-point attempt. “That’s his job,” Bryant said. “I’d be upset if he was letting me skate through things. If you make mistakes, it’s a coach’s responsibility to point those out. If he can’t point that out to me, he has no chance in pointing that out to anybody else.”
Timothy Meaney, CEO of Kindling, a collaboration tool used by Symantec, Motley Fool, Nordstrom and Credit Suisse, sent out copies of The Myths of Innovation to some of their favorite customers.
He kindly sent me a photo, which I promised to post here.
Should you be inspired to do something similar with one of my books for your clients, friends or armies of creatives under your employment, and give me an interesting picture, I’d be thrilled to post about it here too.
At the book launch party for Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds last month, Much fun took place.
(Photos by Shawn Murphy)
I set up a big wall upstairs in the back where people could write topics they wanted me to see me write about.
Wow.
It took up three huge sheets of paper, and some folks drew pictures, diagrams and other creative ways to express their suggestions.
Here’s the list. Some silly, some serious, some both:
No introduction necessary:
We believe life is a constant series of small decisions that most of us leave up to someone else to decide. By taking charge of those decisions yourself – even the smallest ones – you can change your life from mundane to magnificent.
From the Married with Luggage blog (A 40 something couple sold everything and travels the world)
Blurbs, the quotes from famous people that appear on books, are curious things. They’ve been around forever, and show no sign of going away. It takes work for an author to get them. When you see a high profile name on a book it means the author, or their editor or agent, is well connected. It’s not a democratic nor meritocratic process.
The work involved goes something like this:
It’s a long, nag-filled process. Reading a book takes time, as does writing a short quotable summation of it.
Some famous people never give blurbs (I know because I’ve asked them, and they told me). Other famous people love to blurb as many things as they can (It’d be interesting for someone with google-fu to see which famous people give the most blurbs). It’s likely many famous people give blurbs without even skimming the book (quid-pro-quo blurbing is common), whereas others insist on reading the entire thing before considering anything.
My first 3 books have many great blurbs from famous people, and I’m grateful for them. But for such a small piece of copy, people have very strong opinions about what they do or do not imply.
The singular blurb for my new book, Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds is unique. It’s unusual because unlike every other blurb I’ve seen, I, the author, wrote it myself. “You are smart enough to buy books for better reasons than a famous person you don’t know saying you should.” It’s my book, why not be honest?
I hope you find it amusing, or at least clever. Here’s why I did it:
Did I make a mistake? Do blurbs make a big difference in your book purchasing decisions? If not, what does?
If you want to know more about my self-publishing experience, read this.
You folks are awesome.
I know it’s annoying to keep getting asked to tweet, and post, and dance, in the name of some thing made by someone else. I know you have many other things to do. And I’m grateful to every single one of you who helped out today.
I promised a summary, and here it is.
The summary:
I promised prizes and I will gladly give them out – tomorrow :)
Of course its never too late – if you forgot, the book is still new and every bit of PR helps. All of the specific and easy to follow tasks listed here are always welcome and have value.
Thanks again. More soon.
Due to some unintentional shenanigans on my part, comments were not working here for most of the day. I’m sorry. Thanks to some help from Mike Adams, a developer on my team at WordPress.com, all is now repaired.
Kestutis Gardziulis, one of my kickstarter supporters for Mindfire, asked this question:
How do “crazy” innovations affect serious subjects?
Often crazy ideas in innovation history are described as accidental inventions. Things like how Nutrisweet was discovered when a chemist accidentally licked his fingers, or that Post-It notes were invented out of bad glue. These stories are told as if it were all an accident that could happen to anyone. Most people find stories told this way charming, which is why they’re so popular.
The better way to consider these stories (for anyone serious about creativity) is the people involved were a) paying attention b) working hard.
Any idea, no mater how crazy, silly, or ‘bad’, can be reused in surprising ways, provided a and b are true.
In the cases of both Nutrisweet and Post-It notes, the inventors were not slackers. The only reason they had a chance to make these ‘accidental’ discoveries is that they were in a place of work, and were working. They were not on a beach reading Stephen King novels, nor in their parent’s basement playing XBOX all day (although I do admit, it is also possible to discover ideas in these activities too). The ‘accident’ happened while they were working.
But the most profound thing is that when something crazy happened, they paid attention. They didn’t throw the idea away as most of us would. Instead that asked: “this is weird… how does it work? and what might it be good for?” And set about working hard to find out what the weird or crazy accidental idea might be used for in the world, in some cases, abandoning the initial project that led to the discovery of the crazy thing in the first place.
In another way, crazy ideas that are invented as jokes or as playthings, can also become serious. Silly inventions like Hoola Hoops are now a form of exercise. A similar story is true about the poles used in adult strip clubs. Take a crazy idea from one domain, and bring it into another, and it may become something very serious indeed.
Creativity can simply be seeing a new way to use an old thing, or having the insight and courage to borrow an idea from one domain, or designed for one purpose, and apply it to another.
What stories do you know of, of an idea from one field being reused in another? Please share in the comments.
Andrew Rosen of Jobacle, one of my kickstarter supporters for Mindfire, had this request for a blog post:
How do you know it is time to quit your job and put yourself into a project you believe in on a full-time basis (head and heart)?
I try to live life backwards. It’s a cliché, but many cliché’s are cliché’s because they have some truth in them. I do periodically imagine myself on my deathbed looking back. What do I want to see?
When I do that, answers to questions like this are easy. The time is now.
Many people spend their entire lives with a dream they keep in their back pocket, expecting there to be a day with no distractions or conflicting priorities. In that fantasy, there is a day that will come, on its own, when following a dream will be the easiest choice in the world to make, and everyone, and everything in the universe will point towards the dream. That day never happens. That day has probably never happened for anyone. You have to make that day happen for yourself, often in spite of some reasonable advice to the contrary.
Most people reading this post live comfortable lives. No matter what choice you make, you will live a reasonably comfortable life, historically speaking. Review Maslow’s hierarchy of needs – no matter what you do, you’ll likely be ok. You have the power to take a big risk or two over the course of a lifetime and survive, or possibly thrive. But never taking a chance? Never making sacrifices to find out what’s behind that dream or what’s on the other side of that fantasy? Over the long view of a lifetime, that approach makes little sense.
If you want specific plans for how to quit, see: Should I quit my job now.
Josh, one of my kickstarter supporters for my Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds, asked this question.
My place of employment is closing. The problem is the mood is very somber and depressing. How do you work within that environment and not let it bring you down?
If you stand back, way, way back, the entire solar system is a sinking ship. We know the sun has just a few billion years left, and if we’re still stuck on planet earth, we’ll go up in flames with the rest.
Meanwhile, can we thrive here? Of course we can.
Whenever I hear of a group in trouble, or a project not going well, I think of the earth and the sun. If you frame a problem right, you can thrive anywhere. Even Sisyphus himself, according to Camus, had moments of joy here and there. I admit you can’t always thrive in terms of productivity, but you can thrive in spirit.
First, its when times are tough that leaders earn their pay. It’s easy to lead when everything goes perfectly. In some cases, a leader might be doing nothing at all, and ride on the waves of producvtity driven by the people who work for them. But when things go wrong, or there’s bad news, or the sun starts exploding, that’s when a leader earns their pay.
What goals can be set that people find interesting? What skills can people learn before the project is over? What sources of pride can be cultivated and directed at the remaining work? There are always ways to make the boring interesting, and the dull fun. It just requires someone who has authority to choose to use that authority to motivate and inspire.
I’m not suggesting denial. Everyone will process the end of a project or a company in their own way, on their own time. But for those who can find ways to stay motivated and excited about what they’re doing, they should be supported and encouraged to find ways to involve others.
Lets say there are 100 people on a project that’s ending. Everyone will be somber when it’s announced. But the following week, what if there are 5 people, working together, having fun, and being productive. The other 95 will start to notice, and many of them will want to join the 5, in spirit, if not in work. Not everyone will be capable of coming along, but you’d be surprised. If a key leader or two take up with the minority group, it can soon become much larger than people think.
At the end of the day we all face situations we can’t win and can’t control. The question then becomes: how will choose to face those situations? Like Sisyphus, choosing how to respond to what we can’t control might just be the most important and defining decision we ever make.
To help spread word of the new book, I’m asking everyone I know to tweet, post or facebook about Mindfire.
The goal is to see how high we can get the amazon.com ranking to go. Its been hovering at around #11,000 since launch. Can we get it to 7000? 2000? Lets find out.
I’ll be tracking who helps (make sure to reference @berkun, www.scottberkun.com, or my name on Facebook), and giving away prizes like amazon.com gift certificates and signed copies of books.
To participate is easy. Do any of the following RIGHT NOW:
1. Tweet about Mindfire. Here’s a sample tweet you can use: “Great book – Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds – fast, fun & provocative read on big ideas by @berkun http://amzn.to/mindfires #mindfire”
2. Post on Facebook. “Great new book Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds, a fast, fun and provocative read on how you think, work and dream. A great gift for creatives, leaders and thinkers – http://amzn.to/mindfires”. (Tag me at Scott Berkun so I’ll see it).
3. Post on your blog. You can reuse the samples above, and also mention the free preview of the book, which can be found here: http://bit.ly/mindfirepreview. Make sure to have a link to www.scottberkun.com so I can track it.
4. Buy Mindfire as a gift, or for your team. Any sales today would help enormously. If you can think of friends or co-workers who need a good read, it’s a win-win: http://amzn.to/mindfires. (Also, you can gift the kindle edition of the book – it’s on the same page). You can simply tweet, FB or blog about the fact that you the bought the book.
5. See who else you can get to do any of the above.
Cheers for all the help!
In return, I have a stack of new posts I’ve been saving up, and you’ll see me posting and tweeting about them today.
Noticed a small usability issue with how Amazon.com promotes Kindle editions of print books.
This is what’s known as a bad default – it often happens when there are multiple defaults that could be considered logically correct, but only one is going to be considered correct by most users.
The scenario: while there is a separate URL For kindle editions of books, most often it seems people are sent to the print edition page, which shows the list of formats in a nice box in the middle of the page.
As you can see in the image below, the kindle edition listed is old. It’s for the first edition of the book. You’d only notice this if you hovered over the kindle edition link long enough to see the old cover and pub date, which people in a rush to purchase are unlikely to do.
To find the latest kindle edition, you have to click on the little + icon to the left, and then click on the newer edition listed below. Surprise! The best, most awesome edition of the book is hidden down below.
The solution:
Change the default. As a rule, always default to the most recent edition of the book. For anyone who wants the first edition for some reason, they can dig in to find it. For everyone else, default to the most recent.
Lisa James McKenzie, one of my kickstarter supporters, requested a behind the scenes summation of my experience self-publishing my new book, Mindfire: Big Ideas for Curious Minds, a book of advice on thinking, wisdom and living a creative life.
Here are all the questions I’ve been asked, with honest answers:
Want to see the results? The free preview is here – Mindfire Preview (PDF) – its nearly 1/3rd of the book, all for free. Take a look – let me know what you think. So far the book is doing well with nearly 30 reviews.
If you found this post useful, buy the book, ya?
What questions do you have? Leave them in the comments. I’m happy to answer.
“A lot of my job is taking what they bring and turning it into something. This is a chord change, this is this, this a melody, ok – but what does that mean? Where am I? If I close my eyes, where am I? What does this music mean?”
– Eddie Vedder, about Pearl Jam (From Pearl Jam 20)
