Michael J.'s Notio: November 2004 Archives

How Sound Works

November 30, 2004 | Science

Any questions?

Customer-Made

November 29, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Products & Opportunites

Customer-centric development is the most important product trend in a long time. The Trendwatching folks present a great write-up summarizing the issues and opportunities.

Product development today is all about listening to feedback loops. The broadcast mentality of "message, message, message" is dying. [Doc Searls: "There is no demand for messages."] Instead, product developers will need to learn how to listen to multiple constituents (not just their boss), ask questions (not try to tell people what to think), evaluate the context of suggestions (not take everything at face value), and figure out how to engage customers in an on-going conversation (customer service is an asset, not an out-source). The discipline of market research is already changing, thankfully, from quantitative to qualitative methods. There's still room for statistics, large samples, and cool charts and graphs, but more important is the narrative that customers and developers co-create.

And, to be clear, everything is a product. Products are the dominant way that people in capitalist societies determine and exchange value. Even the local land trust "sells" a "product" — participation in preserving land. How do your customer-centric activities and budgets compare with your broadcast message operations?

On Directing Film

November 27, 2004 | Arts & Culture | People & Society

I read this book by David Mamet yesterday. It's a concise 107-page summary of directing for motion pictures, based on a course he taught at Columbia in 1987, after he had finished his second film (following many plays and stage productions). Here are a few excerpted paragraphs:

The job of the film director is to tell the story through the juxtaposition of uninflected images – because that is the essential nature of the medium. It operates best through juxtaposition, because that's the nature of human perception: to perceive two events, determine a progression, and want to know what happens next. [...]

If you aren't telling a story, moving from one image to another, the images have to be more and more "interesting" per se. If you are telling a story, then the human mind, as it's working along with you, is perceiving your thrust, both consciously and, more important, subconsciously. The audience members are going to go along with that story and will require neither inducement, in the form of visual extravagance, nor explanation, in the form of narration.

[Michael J. sidenote: Alfred Hitchcock once said, "When the screenplay has been written, and the dialogue has been added, we're ready to shoot." The implication being that you write as little dialogue as possible, after you have told the story through images first.]

They want to see what's happening next. Is the guy going to get killed? Is the girl going to kiss him? Will they find the money buried in the old mine? [...]

If we don't care what happens next, if the film is not correctly designed, we may, unconsciously, create our own story in the same way that a neurotic creates his own cause-and-effect rendition of the world around him, but we're no longer interested in the story being told. [...]

That's when it stops being interesting. So that's where the bad author [...] has to take up the slack by making each subsequent event more diverting that the last; to trick the audience into paying attention.

The end of this is obscenity. Let's really see their genitals, let's really endanger the actor through stunts, let's really set the building on fire. Over the course of the movie, it forces the filmmaker to get more and more bizarre. Over the course of a career, it forces a filmmaker to get more and more outre; over the course of a culture, it forces the culture to degenerate into depravity, which is what we have now.

This book was originally recommended to me by Robert Fritz, to help cultivate the skill of thinking visually. It's a good read for that alone. But it's obviously helpful for the budding storyteller, to focus energy on the story, and not the "message," the cleverness, or the ironic self-consciousness. Two of the chapters demonstrate by example using transcriptions of dialogue with students, deciding on a few scenes and beats to express the idea of an imaginary film's throughline.

If you've never seen one of Mamet's films, a good place to start would be either Glengarry Glen Ross (1992, winner of a Pulitzer prize), or The Spanish Prisoner (1997, a fantastically intricate story).

The Seven Basic Plots

November 26, 2004 | Arts & Culture | People & Society

Very interesting review of a new book about narrative story forms. Excerpt:

The histories of the novel and of storytelling ran together until the early 20th century; since the 1920s, that history has been one of formal drift, away from the novel as a social form that described how characters live in relation to others, a drift that gathered decisive momentum in the 1970s, as self-consciousness was joined to irony. You may object that the novel, as a result of the century's bitter fragmentation, is no longer required to satisfy EM Forster's tentative claim that "Yes - oh dear, yes - the novel tells a story"; that Joyce's linguistic pile-ups have embarrassed us out of anything so simple; that readers are too aware to acquiesce any longer to the novelist's authority to tell them that, "It was a snowy Sunday afternoon in February," and that Charles and Emma Bovary have gone with Homais and Léon to see a new flax mill near Yonville.

The first of these objections assumes the novel is a vulnerable form, easily manipulated and destabilised. That assumption is hardly borne out by its tumultuous 400-year history. The final objection, that it is no longer as easy to hoodwink readers as it used to be, is simply a slur on our grandparents. And a further obfuscation has grown up: the notion that there is a difference between novelists and storytellers. The assumption here is that the novelist is a creature of form and language, while the storyteller is occupied with the lesser act of narrative. There are several possible rebuttals to this distinction, depending on your literary tastes, but it is salutary to quote a defender of the contemporary literary novel, Fiammetta Rocco, one of this year's Man Booker judges: "Reading 132 books in 147 days... you learn a great deal about why so many novels - even well-written, carefully crafted novels, as so many of those submitted were - are ultimately pointless."

The question for me and my not-so-novel writing project has been: Will a simple, well-written story that explores characters and their lives, in a realistic setting — in other words, a novel cognizant of sociology as well as psychology — be relevant and accepted by an audience? One voice says, "Write for yourself; ignore any idea of 'acceptance.'" That may be true, though it feels like a dodge — why is it so bad to want an audience, and isn't writing just for myself a bit selfish? On the other hand, I do realize that the most personal and particular writing often turns out to resonate with the widest and most general audience.

This review, and the book under discussion, say that in fact the qualities I'm aiming for are exactly what's missing in publishing today. So apparently that excuse for procrastination is eliminated.

Futurists Beware

November 24, 2004 | Science | Science

A friend sent along this photo, which hardly needs any discussion:

Most enjoyable is how it integrates the two most important technologies of 1954, namely, the television and the automobile!

Update: An anonymous commenter says it's fake, and they're right — thanks!

Jetta GLI Snow Tires

November 23, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Life | Products & Opportunites | Products & Opportunites

If you own a 2004 1/2 VW Jetta GLI with the stock 18" BBS wheels and you have to drive in the snow you'll want to read this post to learn what steel wheels will fit on your car for snow tires. Everyone else can read along to learn about how complex products requiring complex services can lead to disastrous customer experiences.

In April I bought the half-year upgrade of the Jetta GLI. It's basically a Jetta with nice-looking wheels, better brakes, stiffer suspension, and a six-speed transmission. Nothing too fancy, it's just a Jetta after all. But I live in northern New England and normally put 16" steel wheels and aggressive snow tires on for five or six months of the year. Don't give me that business about "all-season radials" — I live on a dirt road up a hill and it snows like the north pole some years. Santa recommends Nokian Hakkapeliitta 2 snow tyres on all four reindeer hooves.

Normally I have my snows on by now — it might snow any day — but I'm running late this year. The 225/40R18Y high-performance tires that are stock on this car would literally be a death trap in even 1/4" of snow. You might as well have Teflon tires in the snow. I have to go to Boston Monday, when the first storm might hit, and I was getting antsy. Last week I had stopped in to see my buddies at Interstate Tire where my family has been going for 30 years, and they checked it out and said they'd order wheels. We go through this every time I buy a different car, so I didn't give it much thought.

Hadn't heard back, but they're busy this time of year, so I stopped in yesterday. Turns out they hadn't yet found a wheel to fit. The normal 16" wheel for the standard Jetta won't clear the larger brake calipers on my car. Ruh roh. There's a guy that works across the street with the same car and he called Tire Rack, who generally know what they're doing, and had them ship the "right" set of wheels, which turned out didn't fit either. So Interstate tried a "multi-fit" wheel, with 10 mounting holes instead of five, and that also didn't fit. They were running out of ideas. Hadn't ever seen anything like it. Told me I should probably check with the dealer to see if there's a VW part.

At this point I could insert a long story about how difficult it is to deal with Miller Auto, but let's not bother. When Glenn said that about going to the dealer I groaned, and he apologized. I sighed. Everyone knew what this meant.

So I immediately dropped everything and drove over there, because I was really edgy about it. None of this sounded too good. When I got there, the VW service desk sent me to the parts department — immediately the worst-case scenario.

The parts person was friendly, but didn't know much. Took the information and went to the back, where she and the service manager multi-tasked me with floor orders and tried to figure out what wheels to order. Here's the summary outline of the customer experience:

"No problem, here's the wheel to get. 3-4 days." I said, "Don't be so cocky, no one in town can figure out what fits this car, Tire Rack isn't sure, and the last time I ordered a wheel from you guys it took four weeks instead of four days and cost me a lot of money for a rental car." It would be a special order, and if they didn't fit it was credit only. Two questions: What happens if it doesn't fit; and where is it located and how fast really will it arrive? She goes away to look into it.
"They're in NJ and can be here Monday. If it doesn't fit we'll keep trying until we get it right." Sounds good, doesn't it? Except that I have just one shot to get this right before the snow, and they still can't be sure it's the right part. My pitch: Order them without a deposit, and if they fit, I'll buy them. I've been getting cars serviced here since 1988, you won't have any trouble with me." She goes away to look into it.
"If you're willing to pay our technician rates, we'll pull wheels off the lot until we find the right one, and then order those parts for you." Hmmmmm. So you want me to pay you to figure out what wheels fit on the car? How about instead if you get VW to pay you to figure it out, since they are designing, manufacturing, and selling the car? I explained that it really wasn't in my interest to be the first guy to pay to figure this out, since everyone else will get the information for free. It's in THEIR interest to figure it out, so they can sell us all the right wheels. So, I'm willing to give up my car for a day, a hassle for me, so you can figure it out, but I'm not going to pay you to do that. She goes away to look into it.
"Sorry, can't do it." Okay then, give me a call if you happen to figure it out.

I spend the rest of yesterday afternoon surfing for new cars, figuring that I might actually have to trade in the car if I can't get winter wheels for it. If I wanted a car to park in the garage all winter I would have bought a BMW. The Jetta IS the winter car! Then I realized that the car was only worth $18,000 to $20,000 used (10,000 miles) and I paid $24,000. That's a serious cash hit if I sell it this quickly. (And, by the way, the next time I think about buying a new car remind me about the depreciation.) So I decided to be depressed and angry about it for a while.

Today I drove around from place to place, looking for the car hot rodders in my area who could give me a clue. The motocross racing place didn't have any ideas, but while buying the new U2 CD I asked the owner and he pointed me to the car electronics place. They don't sell wheels, but they did explain how I need a "negative offset" wheel to clear the brake caliper. They said to try the tire place in Enfield. I drove over there, listening to the new CD, and they didn't have any wheels, and didn't plan to get any more this year. "Can I order any?" "No." "Can you help me figure out the spec for the negative offset so I can find one to order somewhere?" "No. The only thing I can tell you is to try R.H. Something-or-other in White River Junction." He said the name, but I don't remember it right now. I got directions and drove over there.

Prospect Street; industrial neighborhood. Place next door repairs 18-wheel tractor-trailers. Went inside and there's a guy with a german shepard working in a concrete floor office, with a big bay next door full of wheels. All they sell are steel wheels. He's juggling phone calls, Thanksgiving plans, keeping the dog down, etc. Highly caffeinated and on the edge of gruff. Nice guy but just really busy. Tell him my story, he looks it up, specs a part number, shrugs. Has a few out back, more coming in tomorrow. Took another phone call while I looked over the catalog. Told him I was skeptical, hard to get, blah blah blah. We went out back and he picked one up to show me the width. "The book says it will fit. It will fit."

I drove over to Interstate tire. They were skeptical too, but if I had time, go back and get one, put it on their account, and let's try it on. Went over an picked one up. As I was leaving I said, "So, if this wheel doesn't fit I'm screwed, huh?" And he said, "Yeah, I deal with the two largest wheel manufacturers in the US. If that wheel doesn't fit, you're getting on a plan to Germany to find yourself a wheel."

Brought the wheel back to Interstate Tire. The guy from next door already had his car on the lift, same exact car, so they popped the wheel on, tightened it up, and it fit! Cleared the calipers! No one could believe it. I was a wheel hero (Elmer Fudd pun intended). So I reserved the first four, and made an appointment for Wednesday to put them on.

The winter steel wheel you want for your 2004 1/2 Jetta GLI is a Macpek X41657. (Quote from Glenn at Interstate: "An X41?? I've never heard of such a thing!")

Brief de-construction: VW sells a car in a cold climate that would be unsafe in the winter. VW has not informed their dealers of an appropriate winter wheel that will fit. The local VW dealer wanted me to pay them to figure it out. The typically excellent mail-order parts companies haven't figured it out yet because this is the first winter anyone is driving this new model. The local tire place is blown away that VW built a car that doesn't take a standard wheel. The industrial parts jobber, with zero marketing, zero atmosphere, and zero customer service training, had extensive product knowledge, supreme product confidence, and immediate inventory. No friggin' guesswork — take one and try it. In science they call it an existence proof. In car parts it's a rare occurrence.

Beware eBay Identify Theft Scams

November 22, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Life

This is a long post with images to clarify just exactly how easy it is to be scammed into giving up your eBay information and much more.

I received an email with the subject "Your account at eBay has been suspended." The text looked like this:

"We regret to inform you that we had to block your eBay account because we have been notified that your account may have been compromised by outside parties...."

That sounded pretty serious, so I clicked the link to go fix it, and got to this normal-looking eBay login page:

At this point, I hadn't noticed the address in the URL, but this would be your first clue. For future reference, "signin_ebay_com_account.barami.co.kr" is not a safe URL!!!

If it doesn't say "ebay.com" as the last domain, you should NOT proceed. I know that's not very specific; you have to know how to read domain names and addresses. I'll try to find a pointer to help describe this better.

Anyway, I didn't notice, and I pay attention to these things. So I "logged in" and got to this page:

(I put two screenshots together, that's why you see the funny scroll bar there.)

Realize that at this point they had already snagged my eBay password, from the previous screen. Here they ask for my email, an alternative password, mother's maiden name, date of birth. Then I got suspicious and look what else they want: driver's license number, social security number, credit card, bank account. Can you believe it? Had I filled in this form, all of that data would be in the hands of someone else, and I probably would have had my identity stolen.

That's a damn fine looking form, and I almost got taken for a ride.

The first thing I did was log into eBay (using the just-compromised password) and change my password. The next thing I did was write this blog entry. Now I'm going back to work.

I Am Charlote Simmons

November 22, 2004 | Arts & Culture | Arts & Culture

I read Tom Wolfe's new novel last week. A super-smart country girl from Sparta, NC heads off to the prestigious Dupont University to explore the life of the mind. (My comments will not spoil the plot.)

The book is getting fairly bad reviews. NPR panned it. David Brooks in the NYT found at least something to like. This three-day dialogue in Slate covers the basics and ends up kinda balanced. Here's NPR's 8-minute interview with Wolfe, along with an excerpt. I rather liked the book, so I'm glad I read all the bad reviews after I had read the work itself.

The book does have a couple of flaws. For instance, the language is probably exaggerated in its vulgarity. But perhaps not by much. I mentioned that I was reading this to an Academic Dean and an Admissions Dean this past week, and both had heard the reviews (but not read the book) and said it didn't sound accurate. I'm sure students talking to their Deans don't talk in "Fuck Patois," but I bet the dormitory slang approaches Wolfe's patter. The fraternity scenes certainly had the ring of truth.

And there were a couple of inconsistencies that would have been caught with better editing. Example: A description of six students riding in a Suburban SUV, with one leaning against the window, across from the sliding door. Of course, a Suburban has four doors; the scene was probably originally written with a van in mind, when the author realized that ultra-cool college students don't drive mini-vans, silly, and changed it to an SUV.

Chalk all this up to a choice between delivering the 700-page tome in time for holiday sales, or making it 5% better; the publisher choose the sales. I forgive them. The fact that a 70-year old white guy could write a convincing college novel from the perspective of a female lead is something quite amazing.

The book is not "about" sex, contrary to much publicity. But let us congratulate the PR people on getting that thought into the mediasphere, where I'm sure it will help sales. The book deals with a lot of sex, sexual overtones, and a lot of non-erotic sex scenes. But don't get all excited, this isn't Fear of Flying.

To me the book is "about" assimilation, transformation, and recognition. And status. Lots of status. What gets assimilated, transformed, and recognized are aspects about oneself, one's upbringing, one's nature — and one's status. Some of these aspects are obvious and clear, and some are subtle and ambiguous. I could address this more directly if I were willing to provide spoilers, but let's say that the ending is cleverly tied to the title, and that the resolution, while satisfying storytelling, leaves me uncomfortable about some aspects of human nature. The result being: Good book; I've got some things to think about in the days following.

My memories of college are expansive, fun, exploratory. Some other memories of college life this book resurfaced for me were loneliness and distance. Memories like being the first one into the dining hall to eat and get out of there so I wouldn't be seen eating alone; general roommate alienation — being randomly thrown together with someone who is neither a friend or a companion; long walks wondering what everyone else thought about a topic of the day. And I was a popular, engaged student with lots of friends! I can only imaging what some people went through.

[An interesting read lately has been Aaron Swartz's weblog. Aaron just entered Stanford and his day-by-day accounts provide "real-voice" support for much of Wolfe's main thesis (modulo the sex). History lesson: Aaron won the ArsDigita prize for software engineering in 2000, when he was 13.]

One of the most powerful passages in the book describes Charlotte's depression. I have never experienced anything deeper than a miscellaneous malaise, but in reading this 100 pages of self-pity, self-loathing, and complete hopelessness, I felt sick to my stomach.

The plot is pretty good, with three sub-plots revolving around Charlotte's primary story, and the whole thing wraps up nicely at the end, without much contriving. As a budding writer I could see a bit of the backstage mechanics, but I was looking for them. Example: When Adam was rushing up to the stage at the rally, to talk to the professor, I thought, "Dude, don't go there!" But a while later, it was clear that in order to establish Adam's credibility, that scene, or one similar, had to occur. It's hard to tell if this is good or bad. Like I said, I was looking for plot mechanics, and I found some. As an aside, the four main characters align pretty well with the King, Warrior, Magician, Lover archetypes.

I Am Charlotte Simmons is a breezy read. It was both an enjoyable trip down memory lane, and a current calibration to college life. It's as "accurate" as any other fiction, with a satisfying story and somewhat surprising (but resonant) conclusion. There are worse ways to spend 20 hours, as Charlotte could attest.

Iterative Development

November 21, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Products & Opportunites | Science

New Dog Old Trick has an interesting post called The Train is Leaving the Station about date-driven vs. content-driven software releases. Actually, the New Dog's post points to and is titled the same as Ed Sim's post on the same topic. Excerpt from Ed:

There are a couple of different ways to manage engineering releases. One engineering release is date driven, the other is content driven. In a date driven release, the team knows when the next release is out but does not know exactly what will be in it. The release runs like a train schedule, whoever makes it to the station on time is part of the release. The other release is content driven; the team knows what is in the next release, but does not know the exact ship date. The release runs more like an airplane shuttle, it takes off only when full.

Both Ed and New Dog prefer the date-driven approach. And if I were running Microsoft, or a company trying to be Microsoft, then I would too. Date-driven and content-driven are both from the "waterfall" school of software engineering. Here's a description of the benefits from Builder.com:

Waterfall development makes it easy to keep your project under control. It limits the amount of cross-team interaction that occurs during development, it’s relatively easy to estimate, and it allows for greater ease in project management since plans aren’t constantly being revised.

Yeah, that's what we need in software: less cross-team interaction, and less revision. Instead, let's focus on ease of estimation and project control. [/end sarcasm] Waterfall, it's been nice, but your time has passed.

As a commentator to Ed's post indicates, the problem of date-driven vs. content-driven is much less relevant in software as service businesses. Software as service allows a much more nimble market-driven approach variously called Feature Driven Development or Agile Development. I like the Iterative Development label, which emphasizes the on-going prototype-test-release aspects.

With hosted software, such as the poster child Salesforce.com, fixes and features can be rolled out continuously without requiring customers to install new software. This means that if the vendor finds a bug, they can simply fix it, test the fix, and update a single server (or cluster) and the customer gets the fix on their next login.

In fact, most content-driven releases fail because too much content is loaded into the release. If management or marketing Just Has To Have a certain set of features in time for the trade show, the annual magazine ranking, or the sales conference, then engineering is set up to fail. It's just one manifestation of the larger problem of team silos, lack of organizational teamwork, disconnected management, and departmental competition.

In the iterative model, you might not release for every single feature, but you specify, develop, and test feature-by-feature, and package releases into smaller chunks that can be rolled out whenever you want. Sometimes a significant customer has a great idea, and you can please them immensely if you release that feature a week or two later. That sort of service buys a LOT of word-of-mouth and loyalty.

A very big advantage of iterative development, and one that is not often discussed, is that customers can assimilate software improvements more easily when presented in small chunks. Every new release of Microsoft Word generates a thrash due to the long list of changes. Every time Salesforce.com adds a new feature or three, customers say, Wow, great new features! Then six weeks later there's another release with a few more bite-size features. Customers prefer software improvement via incremental updates over monster releases that require a productivity hit while they learn The New Way.

If you need any final encouragement, you might look to Adam Bosworth. He's a serious engineer, who built DHTML and Internet Explorer for Microsoft, played a key role in defining the XML standard, built the web services infrastructure for BEA, and just recently moved to Google to work on software services like their email product, Gmail. If he says that software as service is the way to go, even if limited to "normal people" apps instead of "power-user" apps, then it's probably a good time to get on board, if it's not already too late.

In summary, if you're going to force your customers to install software, you're probably going to use a waterfall method. My sympathies. In that case, the date-driven approach is probably best. If you are developing new software and it's not delivered as a service, you better have a good reason. And if you've got this great new distribution method called hosted applications, there's no need to be tied to the development approach that drove the IBM 370 team in 1970. Choose a modern iterative method instead, and focus on your ever-changing customer requests and market forces.

Viruses could be good

November 11, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Products & Opportunites | Science | Science

Computer viruses are bad. There's all manner of havoc they can wreak on unsuspecting users. Spyware, adware, popups, data loss, drones, hidden ftp sites, etc. etc. etc. And the talent required to write some of these viruses is astounding. Yes, there are some "script kiddies" who just cut and paste, but original virus authors are often brilliant and insightful programmers.

So what if the energy that creates computer viruses could be put to good use?

For instance, my colleagues and I have spent the last week debugging the HTML and CSS code from a relatively straightforward website design. CSS is great but the various browser implementations are not. Fix a problem for IE 5.x, watch a new problem appear in Firefox. Fix a problem for IE 6.x, watch your Netscape 6.x support tank. To be blunt: This is a major drag on productivity and lessens the utility of CSS. Plus, it totally sucks to work on problems like this — it feels like a waste of human potential. From the client's perspective it was very expensive to get this right. Most clients can't afford this level of detail.

Further, even if the latest browsers and offer good standards support, the installed base of existing browsers is vast and few will ever be updated. My parents are not ever going to update their home computer browser unless I show up and do it for them. Most users won't deal with it. Looking at the web traffic logs for a small northeastern college, I see that Netscape 2.0 hit for 1,574 sessions (out of a total of ~600,000) — and Netscape 2.0 was current in 1995!?!?

But what if you could write a virus that patched browsers and fixed the incompatibilities? What if a virus writer was clever enough to figure out how to patch the dreaded 4.x browsers to update their HTML/CSS rendering engines to bring standards compliance?

This would be a real win, and welcomed by the web design community. The virus writer who pulled this off would be a hero, and could write their own ticket at any computer programming job in the world. It could be the basis for a hugely successful commercial product. Thousands of hours, worldwide, every month, would be saved by this work. The art and practice of website design could advance to greater creativity because instead of spending 40% of the design budget working around browser bugs, that effort could go toward better visuals, more usability testing, or better photography.

If you are a virus writer wasting your time figuring out how to steal bandwidth to store p*rn on someone's computer, instead consider figuring out how to infect every computer in the world with a good HTML/CSS rendering engine. You'll end up on the cover of Wired, web design babes (and/or dudes) will fall all over you, and you'll have enough money to buy Fiji. I kid you not, this is a real opportunity.

Multi-pass processes

November 11, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Life | People & Society

If you're testing something (software code, a web page, whatever), it's often helpful to use multiple passes to accomplish your task. The first thing you want to know is: Is it grossly wrong, or basically okay? Then, once you know that it MIGHT be working as expected (as opposed to "definitely not working"), you can take another pass at the next level of detail. And so on. In two or three passes it's obvious whether you should continue on into the details or stop to fix something wrong at a higher level. The is the fastest path to completing testing, and many other forest & tree activities.

In a way, this is like the trick that excellent math students use to add a column of numbers. People who are "good with math," when presented with a column of numbers to add, will go from left to right, adding all the big numbers first, and adjusting them as the smaller numbers overflow.

For example:

We're taught in school to add the right-most column first (8+8+7+9). Carry over the digits greater than 9, and move on the the second-right-most column (3+7+1+2). But math experts all seem to add the left-most column first (4+3+1) and then move to the second-left-most column (2+6+2+8). This "most significant digit" approach is exactly the opposite of what we're taught in school, and it's very similar to a multi-pass testing regimen. The general idea is to start with the most significant information, and then move to the next-most significant information, etc.

The next time you start a task, survey the situation and try a multi-pass approach. Most likely, you'll be done faster, and with greater confidence in your results.

Accountable once a decade, at least

November 8, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Governance | People & Society

This year I've personally observed just how hard it is to fire someone in academia (newsflash!). Some people turn out to be non-productive — that's to be expected. Much worse if they're toxic to the people who are ARE productive! But somehow they stay forever. (Note to clients: I'm not talking about any of you folks, don't worry. But I bet you know someone LIKE who I'm talking about.) Meanwhile, colleges and universities take MONTHS of committee review time to hire anyone, at any level - flying people in from out of town for jobs that are 99% sure of going to an internal candidate.

Wouldn't it be cheaper and easier to hire people quickly and if they don't work out, fire them quickly? Or, at least, if you're going to take a long time to hire someone, at least be able to fire them easily. The process of taking forever to hire someone, and then also taking forever to fire them seems like the worst of both worlds.

Perhaps the problem boils down to what Edward L. Ayers wrote recently in EDUCAUSE Review (vol. 39, no. 6, November/December 2004): "Higher leadership is generally transitory, amateurish, and constrained but is the only force providing any coordination or direction to many otherwise disconnected scholars, departments, and disciplines." Of course, the senior leadership I personally know are thoughtful, engaged, and committed. But none are formally trained as managers of large multi-tiered specialist staffs.

Meanwhile, I was thinking recently that one solution to academic "coordination or direction" issues (i.e. slow adoption of technology, interminable faculty meetings, imponderable decision-making, general cat-herding behavior) is to have standard tenure be ten years in length. Lifetime tenure would require a special appointment after at least one (or possibly two) ten-year appointments. That way, you'd have to be accountable at least once a decade.

Of course, current faculty would be grandfathered in under the existing rules....

Opportunity: VW-branded biodiesel

November 8, 2004 | Business & Commerce | Nature & Environment | Products & Opportunites | Science

Here's an example of an important new product opportunity.

Volkswagen has a turbo diesel engine called the TDI. It's available in the US and Canada in their Golf, Beetle, Jetta, Passat, and Tourag cars. It runs on diesel fuel, and depending on the model gets up to 50 mpg. It's also really fun to drive; diesel creates very high torque at low RPMs, so it's quick off the line and sporty. The best part is this: Without modification, it can run on biodiesel fuel. (official industry trade group, Hawaiian producer, Veggie Van, make your own) For instance, you can run used McDonald's fryer grease, or vegetable oil. These are extreme examples - biodiesel is a term that can mean a lot of different types of fuel, but they're all renewable, in the sense that they're grown, or recycled, or whatever. They're not fossil fuels.

Another piece to the puzzle: Volkswagen is having a rough time right now. Profits are down, and they're stretched thin between making "people's cars" and reaching into the high-end $70,000 luxury car market. They have a difficult labor-cost structure, and they've had some quality problems. They need an image change, representing not just a new slogan, but a new focus.

What VW should do is hire me to lead an effort that would introduce VW-branded biodiesel into the market. This might take the form of VW filling stations, a co-branding effort with an existing fuel marketer, or simply "greasing the skids" and moving this idea forward in the industry. This would be a complex product development project. A fuel supply must be ramped up, a distribution chain must be created or tapped into, a brand created, advertising, word-of-mouth, etc.

And the results: Volkswagen would own the mindshare of "locally grown fuel." Or, "normal cars, renewable fuels." Or, "German cars, fueled by American corn." Etc. You get the idea. This could spark a major interest in VW TDI cars. The only other mass-produced consumer diesel is the Mercedes.

VW is in the perfect position to capitalize on the immediate need for new fuels. In Europe, the TDI engine is the best-selling engine, and is available in five configurations. They've got the production capacity to ramp up and own this market. Further, these new fueling stations can be the link to all sorts of other services. Think "Apple Store for your VW."

This would be a positive development in the world, and I'd be happy to contribute my talents.

What do you want to create today?

November 8, 2004 | Arts & Culture | Business & Commerce | Life | Products & Opportunites

Ten or twelve years ago I was talking a lot about the choice between being a "creator or consumer." Today, I re-affirm my choice as creator.

This is about more than "being creative," whatever that means. It's about making things, making connections, making artifacts, making a difference. It's about playing my small role to improve life; to create instead of critique.

We have some significant opportunities for change, and there's no reason not to participate.

Which is another way of saying, We've got some major problems in the world, and we better get going.

Yes, I am depressed at the election results. I am depressed that a 3% majority is considered a "mandate" that "earned political capital." There are lots of things to be concerned about, and if we focus on "fixing what's wrong," we'll fail. The game's too swift, the target is always moving, and it's defined by someone else. (OTOH, if the information in those links turns out to be true, we've got a major problem on our hands.)

No, we must decide how we can contribute. We must choose how to apply our energies. We must figure out how we can "be the change we want."

Here is one possibility: During my career, I have created, co-created, or been the team leader on nine commercial products. I'm a "1.0" product guy. For a long time, and maybe again soon, my slogan was "from concept to customers." The 1.0 product launch needs a wide variety of skills and insights: customer research and requirement analysis, engineering capability and sequencing, prototyping, creating marketing materials, building lots of relationships, raising money, pitching pitching pitching. I do all that, working with other smart committed people, pushing the 1.0 out the door, and then help find specialists and experts to keep it rolling.

Now I'd like to take this entrepreneurial attitude and work on products that have a larger impact. That mean something to the world. How about alternative fuels? How about medical products? How about innovative education products? How about products that might build shared understanding, common ground, self-awareness, a sense of interdependency and wholeness - in any arena?

I own and operate a professional services firm with expertise in organizational learning and product development. I'm looking for introductions, conversations, collaborations — fuel for the fire. Let's stay in touch. Tell me about the opportunities you see, the changes you'd like to create, and let's see how we might work together. Or at least, let's keep each other in the loop. It's a big world out there.

Updating Weblog Archives

November 7, 2004 |

This morning I'm reorganizing my weblog. Deleting categories, reorganizing entries, changing archive URLs. I've probably broken most inbound permalinks to the site, but it had to be done at some point and I decided "the sooner the better."

If you want to see if your links to me are broken, here's an advanced Google query that should help:

 notio site:yoursite.com

My apologies for the hassle. (I realize that it's rude to break inbound links, and it's worse for me than for the linker, but I needed a reset, so I've got to live with it.)

Next up, I'm deciding if today is the day to change the site templates. I'm done with the red and orange, but the change will take several hours work, most likely. If I'm using cliche's to make decisions, then I suppose "there's no time like the present."

[Update: Did it Sunday night. This concludes the meta-weblog work. On to writing.]

Peter Senge Event

November 6, 2004 | People & Society

Peter Senge (The Fifth Discipline) gave a lecture in my hometown on the day after the election, Wednesday November 3. It was sponsored by two excellent community organizations, the Upper Valley Business Education Partnership and the Upper Valley Teacher Institute. I was involved in hosting the event, and introduced him onstage. For posterity, here is a very lightly edited version of what I said:

Thank you, good afternoon.

I wanted to say a few words about the Upper Valley Business Education Partnership and introduce you to the important work they do in our community.

Since 1996, the Partnership has been marshaling resources to bring schools, students, teachers, and businesses together in an on-going, integrative dialogue. Their programs are designed to bring community members into schools to share their expertise; to bring teachers into businesses to learn how their teaching is applied; and to bring students and businesses together to explore career options. I have personally found this work very rewarding, and if you would like to participate, please get in touch with any of their staff here today, or visit www.uvbep.org.

Today's discussion is the culmination of a series of events, including two book groups, a few informal gatherings, email discussions, and a smaller workshop held earlier today. If you are interested in joining with this work after today's discussion, please see the folks in lobby and drop off a business card, or sign up there to stay in touch.

I would also like to mention the important collaboration between the Upper Valley Teacher Institute and the Upper Valley Business Education Partnership. It took the efforts of two vital non-profit organizations working closely together to create this series of events. And we should thank Carrie Brown, Kathi Terami and all of their colleagues for the planning and organizing that brought us together today. Thank you, Carrie and Kathi.

As for today's program:

We have people here from both sides of the river, and I want to welcome everyone here from VT:

Hartford, Fairlee, Norwich, Wilder, Thetford, Hartland, Windsor, Bradford.....

And I also want to welcome everyone here from NH:

Lebanon, Meriden, Lyme, Orford, Hanover, Piermont, Cornish, Claremont, Enfield, Canaan.

Between our twin states is a river that separates us. The CT river winds its way from northern NH, through this Upper Connecticut River Valley, through MA and CT, and out to sea. Sometimes, especially during commuting times, it seems like this river divides us. It certainly makes it inconvenient, since we rely on just a few bridges to drive from one side to the other.

We live in a time where many things appear to divide us. Maybe it is simply a part of these media-saturated times to more easily see our differences than our commonality.

But perhaps it is possible, by shifting our perspective, to find some uniting principles, some uniting systems, that can bring us together on common ground. In this mindset, our river that divides us also unites us. Its currents flow between the banks of our borders, like a membrane between cells, separating yet connecting, interrupting yet bridging the two states, and bringing them together - one river, one watershed, one bioregion, one nation, one planet earth. If you step back far enough, our CT river is not a divider at all, but just another part of the whole system of our water supply, our recreation, and the beauty of this valley.

Today as we think about systems, education, communities, and business, perhaps we can step back and shift our perspective a bit, seeing things in a new way that builds on our strengths and commonalities, rather than our weakness and differences.

Our guest today has lectured extensively throughout the world, translating the abstract ideas of systems theory into tools for better understanding economic and organizational change. He has a particular interest in decentralizing the role of leadership in organizations to enhance the capacity of all people to work productively toward common goals.

Dr. Senge's work articulates a cornerstone position of human values in the workplace; namely, that vision, purpose, reflectiveness, and systems thinking are essential if organizations are to realize their potentials. He has worked with leaders in business, education, health care and government, and we're very fortunate to have him with us today. Please join me in welcoming Dr. Peter Senge.

Updated

November 6, 2004 | Science

As a prelude to my return to active blogging, I have upgraded to MT 3.121. Last month there were almost 1,000 comment spams on this backwater blog. Hopefully the new tools in 3.x will help manage the junk.

[Update: They do. Much better, thanks.]