Matthew Lang

Yesterday was the last edition of my newsletter.

I won't go into all the reasons why I've stopped the newsletter but it really boils down to one thing that Patrick Rhone kindly reminded me of last night.

Saying no is saying yes to other things...

On other news I've embraced Micro.blog a bit more and have been posting frequently there. If I'm sharing any links or smaller posts they'll be found on my micro-blog which you can subscribe to through RSS or even follow me on there as well.

What about here then? I'll be reserving longer posts for here and they're going to be coming over time.

... is knowing what is important.

Don't attempt everything. Do what's important. No, not everything is important.

— Jagged Thoughts for Jagged Times, 237 by Nicholas Bate

Thanks Nicholas!

... defined by Nicholas Bate.

Productivity is no longer simply about 'the things to do', it is about tough, balanced, focused decisions on what not to do.

— Jagged Thoughts for Jagged Times 236 by Nicholas Bate

... with the personal resilience guide from Nicholas Bate.

Kurt Harden is concerned about the erasing of American history.

The first is that it strikes me as an effort to erase history. That never goes well. And I write as an Ohioan with absolutely no sympathy for the the Confederates memorialized in bronze, copper, or stone. The statues represent our past and they offer different reminders to different people.

Erasing history by Kurt Harden

I agree with Kurt on this one.

By removing these statues, the American people are removing part of their history. Yes, these statues represent a side of America that many would like to forget but it's in these statues and the history they represent that we see the progress that has been made.

I've been using Slack for a few years now. I use it more for work than anything else. I am part of a number of different client teams and it's through these that we do most of the day to day communication. I have to be honest it has become something of a necessary evil to have, but it is an easy way to stay in contact with clients. For clients that have only a handful of employees then I recommend that we just stay in touch with phone calls, emails and of course whatever project management tool that works best for the client.

Benjamin Pollack's post about his issues with Slack are good points and with more people turning to apps like Slack, it's worth remembering that Slack isn't a great tool and should only be used if there is a genuine need for it other than, "Hey I need this right now!".

Perhaps the greatest argument against using Slack isn't the filtering of communications or the notifications.

It's the version of Markdown that Slack uses for it's messages. It's just not Markdown.

5. Its version of Markdown is just broken

I’m going to use up an entire heading purely to say that making *foo* be bold and _foo_ be italic is covered in Leviticus 64:128 and explicitly punishable by stoning until death.

— Why I Hate Slack and You Should Too by Benjamin Pollack

What grieves me more is that there isn't a week goes by where I don't end up sending a message formatted incorrectly because Slack has it's own version of Markdown.

Slack isn't a necessary evil but teams should consider Benjamin's points before deciding if Slack is worth using.

Give me email and a phone any day of the week.

... is what you need.

More insightful thoughts from Nicholas Bate.

... with Nicholas Bate.

Major gains.

Basics or essentials? Either way, these are the foundations for anyone looking to level up.

Bonus content at the Deep Productivity seminar in June for those interested. Highly recommended.

Added Annie Mueller to the list.

Who's on your blogroll?

... over at Feedbin.

I love using Feedbin. Such a great RSS reader and the fact that they keep adding to it and improving it just keeps making it better to use.

Driving down to Oxford this afternoon for tomorrow's Deep Productivity seminar with none other than Nicholas Bate himself.

A great chance to meet and a great opportunity to learn.

If you're attending, say hi!

Medium announced it's paid tier called Memberships. I'm not convinced though.

Sure it's great that Medium are finally charging for their product, but there isn't enough value here.

You can count me out.

CJ Chilvers looks at the importance of being small and why avoiding the need to grow can be a good thing.

I've written before about my love of small books, but these past few days I've re-discovered a love of small blogs, small newsletters, and small products in general. Small could mean brief. There's bravery in brevity. Small could also mean minimal, a first step towards something larger.

— The Importance of Being Small by CJ Chilvers

Some essential coffeeshop tips and etiquette from the peeps over at DNSimple.

When you order your first drink ask for it straight away. Having a good relationship with the staff is important so give a good tip. I usually give 40%-50% on the first visit. That really helps get a good start with the people working there.

— Working in coffeeshops by DNSimple

I need to breakout from the home office a bit more often now that the good weather is just around the corner. Paisley only has a couple of good coffee shops worth working in though.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about marketing.

While making my afternoon coffee I was running some editing changes through my head on a post I'm writing. And then it struck me.

If you're not writing, you're not marketing.

I've struggled with marketing my freelancing business in the past, but I certainly could start making a step in the right direction by writing more for my freelancing business.

The no-pressure kind. Manton Reece explains.

I love that blogs can scale from the trivial to the important. The microblog post about what you had for breakfast. The half-baked rant about something you’re passionate about. And sometimes, the rare essay that really hits the mark and makes people think.

— No-pressure blogging by Manton Reece

I've been struggling to blog more in the last couple of years. Partly that's down to me trying to produce too high a level of content. I should just blog what comes to mind. It won't all be great, but every now and again there will be a post that really stands outs.

We launched Ghost about 4 years ago with a $300,000 Kickstarter campaign. Today, it's a sustainable healthy independent business with $750,000 annual revenue and a team of 10, and users including NASA, Square, Vevo, Sky News, Mozilla, Zappos and so many more.

— Ghost on Indie Hackers

Proud to be a Ghost user and looking forward to seeing what else the Ghost team can add to an already great blogging platform.

I've been having a successful run with the bullet journal and implementing Mike Rhode's daily plan bar but as a weekly view rather than a single day's view. Daily plan bars go on the left while a list of tasks for the week goes on the right. I'll do a better write up of this in time complete with a more annotated description.

I know, from reading my friend Kurt Harden’s blog, that we may not see completely eye-to-eye politically. But, a fact of which I’m absolutely certain of is that we could sit down around a campfire with two fingers of whiskey and a decent cigar each and come around to more that we agreed on than disagreed.

— Campfire Diplomacy by Patrick Rhone

What a great idea. I just wish I lived a little closer for this little pow-wow.

by Nicholas Bate.

... goes to planet Earth.

Cal Newport touches on single root commitments and productivity.

The solution to these issues is simple: maintain a single root commitment, that you’ll stick to no matter what, which will in turn help you get the most out of all the other productivity commitments that come and go in your life.

To be more concrete, create a single page document that describes the key productivity rules, habits, and systems (which I’ll summarize as “processes” in the following) that you currently follow in your life.

— On Rooted Productivity by Cal Newport

... this year with Nicholas Bate.

I've wrote in the past about the blogging platform Medium and how I have issue with such a high volume of people writing under one roof and how the lack of

Here's what I wrote at the start of last year:

Access to the network is easy but I can't help but wonder if in the future they'll get it wrong and piss off a good chunk of their user base. I'd rather not take that chance.

— Anywhere but Medium

Well Medium did get it wrong. The ad model isn't working for them. That and fifty of their staff have been dropped. What looks like a cost-cutting exercise is what they're calling a change in their business model. What that business model will be is unclear at the moment.

One option Medium has is to charge users for the privilege of using Medium. If Medium wanted to charge me to use Medium then I would be all for it. I love products that look for money up front before you can use their product. How else are they going to survive as a business?

I like the idea behind Medium but the recent change in their business model (or even lack of one) has me wondering how long they'll be around for. Not a nice thought, especially when it concerns a platform that many use to publish their thoughts and ideas. I'd rather not see it go under, but it needs to start adapting and fast.

Medium still isn't for me though. I'm happy to blog away from my own little corner of the Internet.

I'm starting a newsletter this year.

Yes, I'm a bit late to the newsletter thing and yes this is probably another newsletter that you don't need, but here me out before you make any decisions.

On the 19th of each month I'll send you a long form piece of writing about my thoughts on a topic that will usually revolve around technology, productivity or products. If you like my blog then you can expect content along the same lines, just in a longer form. Each month, I'll also include a link list of interesting titbits from the Internet that have caught my attention and I think are worth passing on.

Interested?

Sign up here then please!

First edition drops on the 19th of January and is entitled, "Back to basics".

You might want to start with Nicholas Bate then.

... to be included in a list of such fine and esteemed bloggers.

Many thanks Kurt.

Who's on your blogroll?

All the things you shouldn't be doing.

via Nicholas Bate

Todoist has just anounced a new feature to their task management platform, Smart Schedule.

Smart Schedule uses predictive modeling to help you easily plan out your tasks for the day and week to come. It learns your personal productive habits, and takes into account patterns across all Todoist users, to predict the best possible due dates for your tasks.

That means those 50+ overdue tasks you have hanging around can be quickly rescheduled en masse, while new and unscheduled tasks can be easily assigned to the best due dates. In this way, Smart Schedule makes it much easier to stay on top of your to-do list and roll with the punches when your day doesn’t go as planned.

— Introducing Smart Schedule, a more intelligent way to plan your day

I stopped using Todoist a number of weeks ago due to the fact that I was just going through the motions of ticking off boxes. It got to the stage where I was micro-managing myself.

This is an interesting move in the market of task managers and no doubt there will be a few other task managers following down this road.

... are the most important.

... from an essential blog to follow. Of course it's Nicholas Bate.

Wally Bock has you covered with your first six steps towards a published book.

Long before any writing starts, most authors spend a great deal of time preparing to write. At this point, they usually don’t have a specific idea about what they want to write, but they do have some ideas and a few hunches about what might work.

This is the stage where you do some research. You probably already have some good sources and you’ve probably spoken about the ideas you want to write about several times. Try to get some more information. Dig down. Don’t worry about being comprehensive. It’s almost certain that you’ll need more research once you start writing.

— How the Book Gets Done by Wally Bock

tips by Nicholas Bate.

... with projects. Pick one today and start. Simple.

... for everyone.

I'm on the fence about this.

Products and companies get acquired all the time. The concern that many have is that Instapaper will eventually be pulled as a product. Not a crazy theory considering that many tech acquisations do this.

I'll keep using Instapaper until that day but there's room now for a similar product that will continue to run on it's own. Any takers?

Find a reason and write.

Or is it just common sense?

During his 15 minutes with each executive, Lee explained his simple method for achieving peak productivity:

1. At the end of each workday, write down the six most important things you need to accomplish tomorrow. Do not write down more than six tasks.
2. Prioritize those six items in order of their true importance.
3. When you arrive tomorrow, concentrate only on the first task. Work until the first task is finished before moving on to the second task.
4. Approach the rest of your list in the same fashion. At the end of the day, move any unfinished items to a new list of six tasks for the following day.
5. Repeat this process every working day.

The strategy sounded simple, but Schwab and his executive team at Bethlehem Steel gave it a try. After three months, Schwab was so delighted with the progress his company had made that he called Lee into his office and wrote him a check for $25,000.

— This 100-Year-Old To-Do List Hack Still Works Like A Charm by Fast Company

Finally starting to see some positive moves from Twitter.

Be great if they could make it easier for the majority of us to verify our accounts as well.

If you want it done, it must be scheduled. If it’s not scheduled, it’s just another item on your wishlist that will never be completed.

— Time To Kill Your Todo List by CJ Chilvers

Words by CJ Chilvers that for a few minutes had me questioning my own todo list's life expectancy. CJ’s words make sense but what he is advocating isn’t killing your todo list. Well maybe he is but I see it in a different way.

You see the todo list isn’t the problem. The problem my friend is you.

If you’re using your todo list in the most effective way possible then you'll be doing two things:

1. Continually reviewing your todo list
2. Syncing your todo list to your calendar

Rather than thinking of your todo list as just a list of things to do, think if it as more than a list. It's a capturing point, a staging area, a place where things go before they are scheduled to be done.

Your todo list items should only be in this staging area for a short time until a window of opportunity opens up in your calendar. Then you can schedule the item at the most appropriate time.

As with most processes, it’s not the tools that are to blame, it’s how you use those tools.

I do a weekly review to ensure that I don’t have anything in my todo list that is stagnating. If it’s been there for a while, I delete it or schedule it for the most convenient time possible. That way it gets done.

My todo list is also linked to my calendar so that when I give a todo item a date and time it appears in my calendar.

My todo list isn’t just a list of things to do, it’s a capturing point, a place to review and a log of just about everything I have done. It’s more than just a list. It's an essential part of my workflow.

The easiest way to get your head round this is to work from your calendar rather than your todo list. Your todo list just tells you what to do. The calendar tells you what to do and when to do it.

Hint: Did you know Todoist can feed your todo list to your calendar? It also includes a link back to your task so that you can mark it as complete when it's done.

I'm still on the fence about Medium. Despite having an account there and no stories posted I still get people following me.

Sure I get what Medium is trying to achieve by making blogging easy for everyone but I'm still on the fence about such a high volume of people using one platform.

Mark Lowenstein highlights a few of the benefits and drawbacks with Medium.

Medium offers very little in the way of guidance or tutorials to help one get discovered. There is nobody one can talk to, unless you’re an established brand or company who wants Medium to host your content. I’d bet many writers would be willing to pay a modest fee, or sign up for a premium membership with Medium, for some help building an audience/following and getting their content discovered.

Discoverability is a problem many people face on Medium but I don't think this a problem with Medium directly.

When you start writing on Medium, you're writing with (and against) thousands of other people. That's a lot of competition, so why not blog elsewhere? It's your decision.

Of course. Get the big picture.

I've been faced with this problem over the last couple of weeks. Read on for the answer.

When you are wondering what to do, when you are stuck, caught between a rock and a hard place, the devil and the deep blue sea...

— What to Do? by Nicholas Bate

With our business health guide Nicholas Bate.

with Nicholas Bate.

... Turn It On Again 22 didn't roll off the tongue as easily.

I love this post from Adrian about what he's learnt from his time as a developer and where he sees himself going next.

Take conscious decisions in your life. Be aware of your actions and their effect. Do not blush or be embarrased for changing your opinions. Say “I’m sorry” when required. Listen. Do not be a hotshot. Have integrity and self-respect.

— Being a Developer After 40 by Adrian Kosmaczewski

The big four-o for me is just around the corner. I can't freelance for another twenty years, or can I?

The Awl remembers the glory days of Google Reader.

Instead, our websites now keep tabs on us, the better to target us and hold us down and turn us into money, like so many caged broiler chickens, puffed up with soybean meal. Doesn’t feel good, does it?

— O Reader! My Reader by The Awl

To be fair it's not all that bad. People are still blogging and the demise of Google Reader as seen a growing market in RSS readers which is great for everyone. The glory days might still be ahead.

Do this.

Find it again.

... with Nicholas Bate as our guide.

... on Planet Earth. Let's start with the first one.

Celebrate more often: you've got a place on the planet, the one consistently rated the best in the known universe. Don't let a day go by without remembering that. That irritating e-mail is just a tiny grain of sand in the enormity of it all.

— 22 Things to Do on Planet Earth by Nicholas Bate

21 more things to do courtesy of NB.

Pen and paper.

An axe review with no mention of its use for taking down the odd zombie.

Rick Grimes would not approve.

Thanks NB!

... for the career you love.

Thanks NB!

AgileBits have announced their new plan for families.

It’s never been easier to share 1Password with your whole family. There’s no sync service to set up, vaults appear automatically, and there’s an Admin Console where you can invite people and manage sharing with your family.

Every family member gets their own copy of 1Password, and their own personal space to store private information. With this, you can give them the tools they need to stay safe without taking away their independence.

— Introducing 1Password for Families

1Password itself is an excellent tool, but this just makes it so much better.

Ghost's plan to relocate their business to Singapore is a blow to innovative internet businesses in the UK.

Why locate your business in the UK if it's going to suffer EU under a tax regulation that was designed to catch out the giant technology companies?

Nor do the numbers lie. According to the EU VAT Action campaign, HMRC has admitted that 78% of the VATMOSS returns being processed in the UK only bring in 1% of the total revenue they get from this scheme. HMRC have gone so far as to eject 3000 of those small digital businesses out of the MOSS system because their tax revenues are so tiny that they are essentially not worth processing. Yet the scariest number in this whole drama was the Campaign’s finding that only 1% of impacted businesses are even aware of the MOSS requirements. That 1% is fed up struggling under the burdens of a regulation designed to go after multinational corporations whose sweetheart tax deals were brokered by EU politicians in the first place.

— Digital platform Ghost leaves the EU thanks to #VATMOSS by WebDevLaw

Ghost made the right decision in relocating and I wish them all the best in their new digs.

The perfect analogy of the relationship between Twitter and the user's of Twitter.

I don't think it's terrible or the end of the world. Life in a silo where you and I are the product. McDonald's doesn't ask the chickens whether they like the options for Chicken McNuggets. A similar thing. The main difference is the chicken probably couldn't say. Humans have opinions, feel disempowered, not heard, not loved, bored, and we like to be consulted. A good shitstorm provides temporary relief for all these ills. So for a while, venting, then life goes back to the normal humdrum.

— Twitter's new timeline? by Dave Winer

Feedbin just won the Internet. Email newsletters direct to your Feedbin.

What a great feature!

And so is productivity revision time with Nicholas Bate.

Belle Beth Cooper's in-depth write up about how she manages tasks and projects is recommended for those looking to get more from Todoist.

Curtis McHale continues his look into winning proposals with a look at four essentials for any proposal.

Real business owners who want to take their business to the next level aren’t interested in airy-fairy notions of how your work will help their company. They want tangible, concrete evidence by which they can measure the success of a project.

— Defining Deliverables, Outcomes, Metrics and Values by Curtis McHale

Still the best blog for freelancers in my book. It's an essential every day read for me.

You know what I miss? I miss blog rolls, where authors would list their favourite sites on their blogs.

— Relative Sanity (@relativesanity) January 3, 2016

I miss them as well, so I've added one. It's a work in progress, so I've started off with my essential daily reading. Expect more updates over the next couple of months.

That's it. The end of another year and the start of a new one.

Start as you mean to go one they say and I intend too. This blog has been lacking in activity of late but that will change.

I just also want to say thanks to Nicholas, Michael, Kurt, Curtis and Patrick. Without my fellow bloggers I wouldn't have the readership that I have now.

Onwards and upwards for 2016!

Follow the seven steps from Nicholas Bate.

There's no shortcuts or life hacks to this. Just honest work, but it's the best way.

Dropbox has decided to call it a day on their photo management app Carousel and the email client Mailbox.

Building new products is about learning as much as it’s about making. It’s also about tough choices. Over the past few months, we’ve increased our team’s focus on collaboration and simplifying the way people work together. In light of that, we’ve made the difficult decision to shut down Carousel and Mailbox.

— Saying goodbye to Carousel and Mailbox by Dropbox

To be honest this isn't going to have any impact on me. I didn't use either of these services, but what's interesting is that we're losing another good email client to a tech giant. I didn't use Mailbox myself but it's clear from the many messages and comments that lots of people used and they rated it very highly.

I remember using Sparrow for a few months as my email client before they were acquired by Google. I loved using it but upon the news that it was being acquired I quickly switched back to using my previous email client.

It's unfortunate that great software applications are acquired and then disbanded or boxed away inside the tech giants. I can't comment on the companies and individuals that are acquired in this way though. I would find it hard to say no to any sizeable amount of money for a software product that I owned.

The latest update to Twitter has seen the replacement of the favourite action with a star to a like action with a heart. Do I care? Not really.

The majority of drivel that is pumped through Twitter these days has me wondering if it's worth spending my time on it. Don't get me wrong there are a few great people who tweet there, they just don't tweet all that often. It's probably not a bad thing to be honest, I could do with stepping back a bit from Twitter.

Nicholas Bate does and so should you.

... with Nicholas Bate.

I try to write in this style for longer posts. People have commented on this in the past but I never figured it to be a big thing.

It seems to be hard for most people to write in spoken language. So perhaps the best solution is to write your first draft the way you usually would, then afterward look at each sentence and ask “Is this the way I’d say this if I were talking to a friend?” If it isn’t, imagine what you would say, and use that instead. After a while this filter will start to operate as you write. When you write something you wouldn’t say, you’ll hear the clank as it hits the page.

— Write Like You Talk by Paul Graham

My favourite RSS reader has a great new feature, image previews.

... The complete list. One of NB's best in my opinion. Definitely in the top five.

There's reading and there's reading. Find out the difference.

via Sandbox Rim

More wise words from NB.

There is another way: work from a 3 by 5 card which highlights your vital few, high-payoff activities. Ignore the trivial many. You can't do it all: the predator is lurking, ready to pounce on the fatal human weakness; trying to do it all and being addicted to the unprotected and swampy by-ways of irrelevant minutiae.

— Jagged Thoughts for Jagged Times 154
by Nicholas Bate

... by our bushcraft guide Nicholas Bate.

8 years and still going strong. Well done Kurt!

There I was doing my morning pages on the subject of selecting tools to work fast when we want to be working slower with a clearer purpose. Next thing I know I'm reading Curtis' post on the same topic. Enjoy the wise words of Curtis.

Why default to fast when slow and involved has so much richness?

— Why Do We Default To Fast?
by Curtis McHale

Nicholas Bate advises you write. A lot.

Nicholas Bate with more thought provoking lists of wisdom.

All I can say is thank goodness for books.

A very nice reminder of why I choose to host my own blog rather than opting for a service like Medium.

From time to time friends ask me what they should use if they want to start blogging, and for a while I was considering adding Medium to my list of suggestions, especially for non-technical writers. But I can’t support this kind of anti-web architecture.

— Dear Medium: Please stop hurting the web by Avdi Grimm

I want to like Medium but it's fast becoming just another walled garden.

I'm still not a fan of Medium for blogging, but that's just my preference. It is a great place for reading though.

For the last two weeks I've been writing my morning pages. The fact that I have managed to keep this going for two weeks is a good sign and I'm glad to be doing it again. The content of the writing itself isn't important, well not at the beginning anyway.

What eventually happens though is that I do find something to write about after those first few paragraphs. The writing then becomes more focused and I start to see where my morning pages are going. It doesn't always become something of value, most of the time it's just a stream of thoughts on the page but every now again there's an idea or thought there than can be the basis for a blog post or an article.

In doing this I've started to realise something

When we make something easy, we reduce its value.

Writing a word is easy. Anyone can do it, but the value of the word is almost worthless. Without context or surrounding words to form a sentence, the word is nothing but a word. It's worthless.

Writing a sentence is just as easy for most of us. Even writing a paragraph should be easy for most of us. And that's when we start to see a glimmer of value. That's when your writing can become something of value. Beyond this where do we go?

Writing a letter, a blog post, a long form article or even a book. As the number of words needed to fulfil each form of writing is passed, the next form of writing becomes harder and harder to do. At the same time though, the value of that piece of writing increases.

Writing enough words to make a book. That's real value. Assuming your writing is coherent and is of a high enough quality for someone to take the time out to read it. That's real value, but it's also difficult to do and that's the trick with writing.

If you want your writing to be valuable then it needs to be more than a word, a sentence or even a paragraph. Shorter forms of writing should be difficult to do but not out with your grasp. Anything longer than this will definitely be difficult to do but still possible.

Writing is difficult to do, but that's what is going to make your writing stand out from the writing of everyone else (or even their lack of writing). You've taken the difficult road to writing something of value.

And do you need to be?

via Nicholas Bate

A nice idea, but I would rather go for a proper bike ride up the hills and make my own burgers when I get home. Healthier and better tasting.

Another classic NB list for on the wall above your desk.

1. The brand evolved organically from outstanding customer responsiveness rather than stilted by-lines and 're-fresh' logos.

— Inside-Out Seven by Nicholas Bate

Read on for the full list.

I've never seen pictures of the bridge while it was being built. Quite amazing.

via Eclecticity Light

Serious ambitions need a serious checklist.

Thanks NB!

More sketchnoting, this time it was the turn of Nicholas Bates' "In 3" posts from last week.

Learning tends to come from acquiring the knowledge of topics that we're not familiar with. This is why as kids we all went to school. At a young age we have limited knowledge of how to read, write and count. Through years of education and study we eventually acquire enough knowledge to allow us to learn and understand each of these topics. We can specialise in this new found knowledge by going to college or university or moving into the workplace and getting a job.

What about what we already know?

There I was this morning setting up a new database for an application I've been working on for a client when I noticed that the application's scripts to setup the database wouldn't run due to a dependency on data in the database that was always assumed to be there. Simply put, I couldn't create the database from these scripts.

So my knowledge of the application has changed and I have learned something new. What I have learned isn't a new topic, just a tiny part of a topic I already know. My experience with the database scripts has taught me that basing the build process of the database on data that is already assumed to be there is wrong.

While we tend to seek out to learn from new topics, we forget that we can also learn from experiences. At time we might think that the knowledge we have is correct, but it's only through experiences that we find out whether it is correct or not. In this case I have raised my concerns with the client about the build scripts for the database and proposed a solution to correct it in the future.

Always be learning. Whether it's from new topics we know nothing of or by fine tuning the knowledge we have through experiences.

... to SwissMiss. 10 years and still going strong!

I really should. My problem at the moment is that I have too many things on the go at once. Something will need to give.

If you're struggling to blog, read this post by Curtis McHale. It will be a reality check for some. A reality check that is needed.

I know I needed it.

Curtis McHale talks about taking your blogging to the next level and hiring an editor.

Working with Diane I get something more though — I get someone to tell me when a post is just plain bad, and if it is, we take it back and re-write or scrap it altogether. She helps clarify my message so I’m communicating with my readers in the way I intend.

— Blogging and Quality Content
by Curtis McHale

... they're teaching the things other business schools don't.

... are everywhere. You just have to look.

Medium's recent announcement that they will start allowing people to use their own domain names for their Medium blogs will be welcome to many, but is it enough to make me switch to using Medium for my blog?

Medium has attracted it's fair share of critics over the last couple of years including myself. A blogging platform where all the content is listed under the one domain. A constraint maybe, but this might be overlooked by the fact that the actual content of the posts on Medium can stand up on their own when the quality of writing resonates with a particular audience.

Despite my gripes with Medium as a blogging platform, I have read and bookmarked a number of well written posts on Medium. I've no problem with the content that people produce, it's more Medium's one size fits all approach to listing all posts under one domain and wrapped in one look.

I have owned my own domain name for almost ten years now. Along with a design, while not exclusively unique to my blog but definitely more unique than Medium's design, I can't see how I could switch to using to Medium as a replacement for my blog. Being able to switch to your own domain is great, but that alone isn't enough for me. Personalising your blog with a look that sets it apart from others is why I continue to enjoy using Octopress. I'm free to adapt and change my blog to whatever I see fit.

At the end of the day I can't say that Medium is a bad choice of publishing platform. It's not my idea of a good publishing platform but my needs and requirements are different from others. It is a good sign though that Medium is moving ahead with plans to allow users to host content on their own domains.

I love Ohio but it is cold. It is Ivan-Denisovich cold. It’s Jack-Nicholson-at-the-end-of-The-Shining cold; indoor-cat-who-became-outdoor-cat-glaring-at-me-from-his-blanket-in-the-garage cold. Never-warm cold. Feet-cold cold. Permanently-hunched-sholders cold. Kurt-Russell-in-The-Thing cold. It is colder than Robert Frost stopping by the woods on a snowy evening - he would not have stopped in this cold.

— That Cold by Kurt Harden

Thankfully Paisley in Scotland doesn't even come close to being this cold. I don't envy my fellow North American bloggers in times like this. The cold weather can get very wearing.

Routine & Ritual. Get the critical stuff, the vital stuff, the oh-so-easily-neglected stuff embedded. Make it a ritual. Make it a routine. Make it a habit. Every other drink is a beaker of water. No 'if's, no 'but's.

— What's More Important Than Ever? 7 by Nicholas Bate

Read on for the remaining six nuggets of wisdom from NB.

A quick reminder to set your direction with NB.

Read from the best, read from Nicholas Bate.

Feedbin has been my goto RSS Reader ever since Google Reader closed. I'm glad to see that development is continuing at a good pace with new features being added regularly, including the new Updated section that includes articles that have been updated after being published.

Excellent for keeping track of changes to articles.

In the last few weeks I've been working on a Rails 3 application for a client. The test suite doesn't cover the whole application, so along with features being added for the client, I've been gradually expanding the test suite to cover the entire application.

The test suite itself uses Minitest and the test syntax. So far I've had an enjoyable experience in adding tests for each part of the application. This week though I faced an issue of duplication in my tests. The application includes a number of mailers. Each mailer has an erb and plain text template. In my first pass at testing this mailer I had some duplication going on with the different templates for each mailer.

assert_match(/Hi there #{person.first_name}/, mail.text_part.to_s)
assert_match(/Hi there #{person.first_name}/, mail.html_part.to_s)

This is just one of many lines in the tests that assert that the two mailer types include the right content. Wouldn't it be nice to wrap these two assertions into one?

Minitest allows you to define your own assertions but up until this time I made do with Minitest and Rails' own assertions. Turns out that adding your own assertions to Minitest is easily done. I included the following assertion in my test_helper file but you can include your own assertions in a seperate file if you want to and then include that in your test_helper file using require.

module Minitest::Assertions
  def assert_mail_match(expected, actual)
    ["text","html"].each do |mail_part|
      assert_match(expected, actual.send("#{mail_part}_part").to_s)
    end
  end
end

What we're doing is adding a wrapper around Mintest's assert_match method and pass in our expected value and the actual value. The method will iterate over the two mail parts in the mailer and assert that each format has the correct corresponding content.

We can now call the new assertion in our tests:

assert_mail_match(/Hi there #{person.first_name}/, mail)

Wrapping these two assertions into one makes sense. The template formats for the mailers is unlikely to change and the two different formats have the same content albeit with different formatting.

After a couple of years of using RSpec, Minitest has been a nice change to how I test the Rails applications I'm working on. Its syntax and single way of doing things means that I find it easier to write tests. Hopefully, I'll be able to share more insights into using Minitest in the future.

... with Nicholas Bate.

It's that catch again. This time looking at the tech behind Odell's gloves.

Beckham’s are custom-made versions of the Nike Vapor Jet 3.0, which features molded fingers, a “strategic mesh,” and “MagniGrip CL” on the palms and fingers. MagniGrip CL is a sticky material made from a mix of neoprene and silicone designed to help receivers hold on to a ball.

— Odell Beckham’s Helping Hands—the Tech Behind the Catch by Nautilus

Whatever Odell was wearing on his hands, I've a feeling that his 10 inch hands are the main reason that he made the catch look so easy.

... with Nicholas Bate.

We need these bike paths everywhere.

Amsterdam seen through the sketchnotes of Mike Rohde.

There were a number of bikes that caught my eye this week, but this GRÜN bike won this week's place in the Fixie Friday archives with its distinctive colour scheme.

via FGGT

What started as a monthly challenge is now fast turning into a social network daily ritual, which isn't a bad thing when it comes to the fast and furious world of social networks.

Back in September, I started a challenge of writing a 256 character post everyday on App.net. Aside from missing a single day's post I completed the challenge. It was a refreshing use of my time on a social network. Rather than simply typing the first thing that comes to your head and posting it, filling the post with 256 characters means you need to spend a bit of time editing, re-wording and ensuring your post is correct and uses all character space available. It's this time spent on getting the message right that makes my 256 character posts so different from every other post I make.

Social networks are often seen as a cheap and fast way of getting messages across to people, so few people think before they post. While they are great for short bursts of information, social networks are mostly places where masses of un-edited information stream by us every day. My #team256 posts on App.net are not wildly profound or better to read than other posts on App.net, but they do provide me with a chance to write something a bit more detailed.

What started as a monthly challenge has fast become something of a daily habit. I'm still keeping the habit going to post 256 characters a day on App.net and while I might have missed the last couple of days, I did look forward to writing my post for the day. I hope that it continues and gathers pace on App.net in the future.

I love using Pixelmator on my MBP, but it's great to see it's now available on the iPad too.

via Tools and Toys

A new look Todoist for all you Mac people. Love this service.

No fads, gimmicks, or shortcuts. Just practical advice and hardwork.

An amazing account of a USMC pilot who ejected from his F-8 Crusader over a thunderstorm.

As the parachute opened, he felt the familiar tug upwards. Except instead of a slow descent, he experienced a rapid ascent. The powerful updraft filled his parachute like a sail and rocketed him vertically thousands of feet at a velocity of nearly 100 mph. During his ascent, he could see hail stones forming around him. The lightning was described by him as “blue blades several feet thick” and incredibly close. The thunder was so loud, he could feel it resonating in his chest cavity and remembered this more so than how loud it was.

— Lt. Col William Rankin - Ejects Into a Thunderstorm by WeatherImagery

via Kottke.org

Nicholas Bate is there to lend a hand.

Many of you will know my love for the Todoist service, but it just got better. The Karma part of Todoist's premium plan just got an overhaul with daily and weekly goals, streaks and it's now much more integrated into Todoist so that you can see it from your iDevice.

Definitely worth checking out.

Write Carl's question on an index card. Put it on your wall. Answer his question. Repeat daily.

I miss longer-form pieces. I miss the minds behind the writing. Anyone can share a link with a snarky comment. I want to read the words behind your thoughts. I want to read your why.

— Share by Carl T. Holscher

Don't worry, there's no biting the heads off bats.

Nicholas Bate's seven step planning list for the new term.

I've been following the tips from this post in the last week and I'm already starting to see the benefits.

Yesterday I mentioned I was embarking on a last attempt to master a different text editor. If I'm to succeed at this, then one truth I must face is that this will take time, just like mastering any new skill does.

I always find that learning something new starts out to be fun. I have a clear goal in mind of what I want the end goal to be and with that in mind I start. Whether it's a new programming language or an application, those first few days are where my positiveness is at a high. After a few days though, the stumbling blocks kick in. I don't feel as productive as I did before. Even though I know I'm in unfamilair terroritory, I start to wonder if this is in fact the right time to be learning something new. A few days further on and I've only mastered a small subset of this new topic or skill. Questioning myself again, I throw in the towel and abandon the learning process. I've done this so many times in the past.

The recurring mistake I've made in the past is forgetting that learning takes time. Mastery takes even longer.

For the moment I'm content to simply learn Vim. This means getting to a stage where for most of my day I can write and manipulate code without resorting to looking up keyboard shortcuts. Finding files, finding text in files, managing files in different panes, navigating a file, search and replacing within a file and basic text manipulation represent groups of keyboard shortcuts that I need to learn in order to use Vim effectively. I've given myself a month to learn most of these shortcuts. After a month I should be able to assess what I can and can't do in Vim. For all the things I can't do, these will become the focus for the next month of using Vim. Repeating this process for six months will evenutally get me to the place where I want to be. To have mastered Vim.

Learning can take hours or days, but true mastery can take weeks, months, even years depending on what you want to master. This is the key to successful learning and mastery, you need to put the time in.

Nicholas Bate is on the ball again with advice on true productivity.

Trade-offs are hard, very hard because they are rarely perfectly resolved. To be comfortable with them we need to have time to have thought about them and time to communicate such thinking to those who are important in our lives.

— On Productivity and Life in the Gaps by Nicholas Bate

... from the trenches.

... without VC's, funding, rock star programmers or a hip office.

It can only be Nicholas Bate.

Carl Holscher is.

We all have strengths and interests. I have been the Mac Guy. But I need the Excel Guy and the Photoshop Woman to be successful. We all have our strengths. And when our knowledge falls short we use the teams’ knowledge.

— Team by Carl Holscher

Start here with Nicholas Bate's summary to building a better business.

A nice reminder from Productivityist that apps are tools just like other tools and need to be revised every now and again to see if they are working for you.

Nicholas Bate has the balance in productivity.

A reminder from Carl Holscher that opinions on everything aren't a necessity.

We IT folk love having backups of data, but what about backups of ourselves?

Carl Holscher describes more.

Being effective is a seven point plan.

Thanks NB.

The complete list from NB.

... a better business, with Nicholas Bate

Nicholas Bate has some pointers to get you started.

Nicholas Bate has 7 productivity boosters to get you on the right track again.

The last few weeks have seen my writing tail off from the schedule I would have preferred to keep. It's meant that I've resorted to writing posts on the day they are supposed to be published. Hardly ideal, but those are the breaks in life.

Right now seems like a good time to take a break for a few weeks over the holidays and regroup. I'll still be posting links to here and maybe the odd written post once a week, but I'll be relaxing my writing schedule until the start of next year.

See you all on the other side!

Nicholas Bate identifies the seven ways to self-destruction.

Tip: Identify and eliminate these destructive patterns.

I've tried to start a number of new habits over the last few months, some of them have stuck, some of them haven't. Here's the ones that didn't stick.

1. Reading 2 books a month - Not really an unrealistic habit but perhaps should have been changed to 'read at least two books a month'. I've scrapped this in favour of just having a list of books that I can work through when I can. Some books take longer than others, so why timeframe it? It detracts from the enjoyment that a book brings. Try this instead - Just make sure you have a couple of fiction books beside your bed and keep reading them. When you finish one, replace it.
2. Logging something I learned everyday - I did keep a separate Journalong file for this but some days you just haven't learned anything significantly new. Instead I just log these as they happen. No sense in making a daily habit of it.
3. Mind mapping - I really wanted to start mind mapping again but the truth is I see little benefit in it now. I think mind mapping has its uses but it's just not on my radar now of things I want to keep doing. Yes I realise that as a past mind mapping blogger this is probably considered blasphemy but opinions change.

The thing is when you set out to start a new habit, it doesn't always work. If you really want it to work, you'll set aside the time to do it and keep on doing it. It will eventually stick.

If it doesn't, then just let it go. When a habit doesn't stick, it's not defeat. It's just your way of saying, I don't need this.

A brilliant idea. A bit like a manifesto, but I would say I was more likely to follow a law than a manifesto.

... the executive's summary.

An amazing account of how an American photoreconnaissance team, in a battered B-17 called Old 666, carried out a mission to gather intelligence on a Japanese base on the island of Rabaul.

During the first fighter pass the plane was hit by hundreds of machine gun bullets and cannon shells. Five crewman of the B-17 were wounded and the plane badly damaged. All of the wounded men stayed at their stations and were still firing when the fighters came in for a second pass, which caused just as much damange as the first. Hydraulic cables were cut, holes the size of footballs appeared in the wings, and the front plexiglas canopy of the plane was shattered.

— The Most Honored Photograph by LensRentals

via Kotte.org

If I'm being honest, I can't exactly remember how I stumbled across Steven's blog. It was a few years ago at least. Anyway, ever since I subscribed to Steven's blog, it's been a treasure of writing tips, practices and great books by Steven.

The first book I read of Steven's was Do the Work. I also read a second book by Steven, Turning Pro. When I first read these books I didn't appreciate their value, but over the last year, I've returned to them more and more found them to be extremely valuable. As for Steven's other books, I have them on a list to read for next year.

Steven's blog is essential for anyone who wants to write. Steven tells it like it is and doesn't sugar coat any of the writing process. It's a hard journey for those involved but he isn't shy in saying that it is a rewarding journey with a great prize at the end for those that are willing to put in the work.

Another great blog to follow if writing is your thing.

I've seen some whacky swings at the driving range, but most of the time the swing has the desired affect. The ball hits the intended target. Steven Pressfield is definitely onto something here.

The concept of the Authentic Swing is that each of us is endowed from birth with our own gift, our own style, our own unique talent and point of view. Our job is to find it and bring it forth.

— Furky swings Authentic Swing, shoots 59 by Steven Pressfield %}

Steven's new book looks to be another addition to the list.

Curtis' post gave me the kick I needed yesterday.

You are choosing to do other things instead of the goals set out.

— No time for whiners by Curtis McHale

I admit, I haven't made a lot of progress on a couple of projects since the summer, and I am choosing to do other things first. In some cases not the right thing. It's definitely something I need to rectify.

... is predicted by Nicholas Bate. I look forward to it.

Last week I talked about why I was bored of the hype surrounding the release of Apple's two new iPhone models. I said that the debate surrounding Apple making progress was really a waste of time.

Then there’s the analysis and opinions of millions of people on whether this is Apple at their best or not. A million pointless questions being asked and everyone has their own answer. Not that it matters of course, because Apple will do what Apple want to do regardless of the views and opinions of others.

— Bored of the Hype

I then went on to write about my thoughts on a picking my next gaming console later in the week. So how can I say that the debate around Apple is pointless and then proceed to write about my first world problem of picking a games console?

Well aside from the fact that I just wanted to write about the similarities with the consoles, I had a decision to make and writing about it seemed to be the best way for me to clarify what I was looking for in my next games console. The thing about this is that the decision I am making matters to me as an individual. It's a small thing yes, but it matters to me.

The small things do matter and they warrant some of your time. Whether it's five minutes or an hour. We can't spend all our time focused and debating on the big issues of the world, we still have our own lives to get on with. So give yourself some time off from the big stuff to think about the small things that matter to you.

I'm writing this blog post on the web application, Draft. It's been a while since I used it. I stopped using it a while back in favour of Byword, but the problem with Byword is that it just isn't sticking as an app that I like using. Functionally it works like a dream, but there's something about it that I don't like.

So I'm giving Draft another go and already I'm enjoying using it. Yes it does do a few things extra than Byword, but that's not why I am using it again. Is it the preference for a web application over a native application? I don't know, it could be.

All I know is that if you're not happy with the tools you have then you should find the tools that do make you happy while you work.

Every time I write a post for my blog, I ask myself this question:

What if the majority of my readers already know what I'm writing about in this post?

I've purposely held back on a number of ideas for blog posts in the past due to this. I get myself into the mindset that the idea for the blog post will be invaluable to the majority of my readers and therefore I dismiss the idea.

However loooking over my analytics for previous posts I have written that I have questioned but went ahead with, I have been surprised by the number of times the posts I thought would quickly disappear into the archives are still being read by more than a hanful of people every day. Even though I had the belief that the post would only be relevant for a limited time and to a limited number of people, these posts are still drawing in new readers every week.

So my advice to you is this. Even if you think your readers won't find any value in your idea for a blog post, write that blog post anyway. Chances are that someone will find value in your blog post rather than no-one.

I first started following Kurt's blog, Cultural Offering, on the recommendation of Nicholas Bate a few years ago. What I love about Kurt's blog is that his is more of a journal than anything else. Political stories, current affairs, sports, family life and of course the occasional shots of what's being cooked on the grill. A true slice of life on the American side of the pond.

You just need to take a look at the categories that Kurt has listed on his blog to see the diverse range of topics he blogs about. There's everything here. And that's the key thing I love about Kurt's blog. Diversity. I like specialist blogs, I really do, but Kurt's blog really stands out because he just posts what interests him.

Always a pleasure to read and always different. That's Kurt Harden.

16 blogging tips from experts. Well worth the read.

... a blog on note-taking.

... for the freelance advice this week.

Seriously, I don't where I would be without Curtis' blog. It almost feels like he's just writing for me personally.

with Nicholas Bate.

Today marks the start of a three week holiday for myself from my daily posts. The last few months have been a challenge in trying to post something every weekday. It hasn't always been easy, but it's been great fun.

Don't fret though, I'll still be posting links, fixies and other goodies through the week if that takes your fancy. I may even post some holiday snaps of sunny Toronto.

Regular daily posts will resume on the 5th of August. See you on the other side.

... is the best hour to write for Curtis. Maybe it is for you too?

Alex Kessinger has compiled all his blog posts on the future of feed readers into one handy little book. The full document is here but there's also downloads in the form of a PDF and a Kindle book.

It's great that Alex has done this as feed readers really are an underappreciated tool. I'm actually glad to see that Google's Reader platform being turned off. It's opened the market for more feed readers that each have their own thing to offer.

... with Nicholas Bate to guide us.

... for all that's part of you with Nicholas Bate.

I originally read about Leo Babauta's text playlist at the start of the year. The idea is that you keep a list of articles that you read on a regular basis and keep them in easy reach. I was sold.

I wanted to create my own text playlist but the problem I had was that I had hundreds of articles to pick from. My Pinboard account gets links saved to it daily and at the last count I was at just over 1300 saved links. Where do I begin to build my list? Searching through my Pinboard links was going to take time.

I let the idea of a text playlist slide for a while until I came across an article that I wanted to add to my playlist and over the last few months I've browsed through a few tags on Pinboard looking for articles that I've frequently read in the past.

At the start of the week I had a breakthrough. Stef Lewandowski's article on creativity was my first article on the playlist and today I recalled a few other articles of the same high quality that I wanted to add. I love this idea of a highly valued list of articles that you can refer back to on a frequent basis. I like to think of it as my "Best of" from my saved links in Pinboard.

So without further ado, I give you my text playlist.

... and armed with productivity tips that get you brilliant at the basics.

.. permission to suck.

To zoom in more on the detail. There's millions of topics to write about if you look close enough.

It's a well known fact that if you're a reader of my blog, you'll know that I love the App.net service. A subscription based network for those that want something more than just ads in their timeline. Since taking up residence on App.net, I've found that I am no longer as active on Twitter.

These days I check it about once a week. Only out of habit really. Previously I was following just 50 accounts on Twitter and today I cut that number in half. I'm now following just 25 accounts. The plan over the next few weeks is simply get this following count down to zero and then delete my account.

I just don't get as much value from Twitter these days. I don't find client work on Twitter, I don't use it for marketing myself as a freelancer (that's what my website is for) and it's been a long time since I marked anything as a favourite there. Really it's just another placeholder for me on the web, but is it really that important to have a Twitter presence now? Once I delete my account it will be gone forever. I might be lucky enough to get my username back if I sign up again but the chances of that happening are remote.

Anyone else out there considering giving Twitter the chop?

Sure. Why not? Your blog is your digital footprint in the world and it is more easily found than physical business cards.

After reading Matt Gemmell's post on designing blogs for readers, I decided to assess my own blog for a re-design.

Here's the parts of my blog I'm not that happy with at the moment:

• I used another template for my site that was similar to the default Octopress theme. They're fine themes to use but I've always wanted to design a theme that suits my requirements.

• The side bar is a busy place. Perhaps too busy. While I do want to have extra information like links to other accounts and other information, I feel this information would be better suited at the bottom of the blog. This way the reader isn't distracted during the reading of my post.

• The fonts used in the current theme make it difficult to differentiate headings from paragraphs. Easy to fix, but I don't want to put a band-aid on the current theme. I want to start from scratch.

With this information I've decided to put together a new layout for the site over the next few weeks. I'm putting a couple of products to the side for the moment. For the next few weeks I am really busy with client work, so I want a side project that doesn't demand too much of my time. This will fit the bill nicely.

Curtis McHale offers some advice for those that are just a little bit too quick to write off change.

... with Nicholas Bate.

Realise your own energy distribution with Nicholas Bate.

Over the weekend I was looking for a replacement for Google calendars. I was sure that I would be at least using Apple’s Calendar service and iCloud, but I wasn’t sure what other tools would be great to support this. So I asked my ADN friends for their recommendations. Within minutes I got a few from people with their favourite scheduling apps and tools. There was a clear favourite but I wanted to wait for more responses. I left it to the next day for more people to reply. The next morning I reviewed all the responses that people had sent to me.

As a thank you, I composed a single post the next day just saying thanks to all of the people that replied to my question. They didn’t need to reply to my question, but they did and I’m thankful for the responses they gave me. Trawling through the responses was a bit of a chore but I managed to get everyone’s name in one post and sent it. It would be nice if you automate this kind of thing.

It gave me an idea. An question and answer management tool for App.net. It’s probably not on the priority list for many users on App.net, but for those that are looking to streamline the question and answer process and make it easier I had a vision for a small service that would do the following.

1. It would allow you to compose #askadn questions with optional hash tags for preferred answers that people should give.
2. It would aggregate the results and keep totals for each response by looking for preferred hash tags in replies or by looking for recurring words in the replies that are given.
3. It would compose thank you posts for all the people that took part. If all the respondants don’t fit in a single post, the thank you post could be split into a number of posts to thank groups of respondants.

It’s just an idea, but the reason I am putting it here is that someone else might already be in the process of building something similar to this idea. Maybe no one is building it, but perhaps someone will. If no one builds it, then I will.

I’m just throwing this out there.

Don't be.

Owen Williams covers the reasons why your opinion matters and you should write about it:

Yes, there are probably a few thousand other content creators out there airing their own opinions on whatever topic you're talking about, but if your opinion is sound, quality and unique then a community will eventually gather around you.

— Too busy consuming to create by Owen Williams

... with Nicholas Bate.

Today I spent an hour getting a script in place that will convert the Wordpress backup of my old Squarespace blog to Markdown posts so that I can pull them into my Octopress blog.

The script itself is almost there but one thing I noticed was how inherently easy it is to work with plain text.

For years I've had the chance of working with a number of different file formats. Some good, some bad. The good ones though were always the formats that contained little or no markup. Not only do they contain less markup, they also require simpler tools to work with them.

Plain text has that advantage.

One thing I will consider in the future when signing up to products and services on the web is how simple the data format is when I need to export data from that service. I'd rather not be wrestling with a difficult to work with file format when simpler formats already exists.

Getting informed is a means to an end, not an end in itself. And life’s too short for bad information.

— A new system for reading by Roberto Estreitinho

Roberto's post was the catalyst for me to step back from subscribing to so many sources of content. Glad to be doing a cull now.

Content is king. I hear this a lot when people refer to what drives the popularity of their blog. Which is okay when your blog is targeted as a specific audience, but does the same rule apply when your blog is personal?

Let me re-phrase that. Is your blog for you or your readers?

I've been very much of the mind that my blog has an audience. Not a specific audience but an audience all the same. My audience likes what I write. Since moving to Octopress though, I have been struggling about what to do with the content of my tumblelog. My heart says to include all the content here, but my head says no.

My tumblelog is a mixed bag of stuff including fixies, tech news and an assortment of links to my favourite posts on the blogs that I like to read. I like posting these things as it's what I like, but I'd still like to continue with a daily essay style post.

One way to maintain two audiences but in the same blog is to provide another RSS feed for readers to subscribe to. One feed will default to only the daily posts that I write while another feed will provide the full assortment of posts to enjoy. This way I hope to blog for myself but also keep the interest of readers in mind by not polluting their feed with posts they don't want to read.

If you continue to enjoy the daily posting routine of myself then stick with the current RSS feed. If you want something more varied then why not think about subscribing to the full assortment of stuff I'll be posting? The new feed will be ready early next week and of course I'll be posting the details here.

For a while now I've been running an essay style blog and a tumble log. They've both got a fair number of subscribers, but one of the complications I have is that in moving my blog somewhere else is that I need to decide whether to bring both blogs over separately, combine them or just bring my essay style blog.

Combining the blogs might mean that I lose readers, but then the offset is that I am brining two audiences together and hopefully they will like the bringing together of content.

Maintaining separate blogs could be a pain, in fact it is a pain. I think I'd like to simply maintain the one blog for the moment.

Bringing my essay style blog over is the most appealing one but letting go of my tumble log might be a bit difficult to do. It's quite personal to me as it contains topics and stuff that interests me personally. However it is only a blog after all.

Then tune in every day to Nicholas Bate. I especially like the last one on the routes to more business list:

Never, ever, ever allow yourself to doubt that you can get a bigger slice of the pie.

I’ve been blogging on and off for the last few years, but more recently I’ve been publishing something just about every day. Whether it’s a little bit of writing or a nicely built fixie, I’m publishing something every day. When I started blogging, I was fanatical about categories. I categorised everything. Everything had it’ place. Now though, not so much.

My tumblelog has a number of categories in it, but these are because the posts I make here are themed. On certain days of the week, I’ll post something in a particular context, Fixie Fridays for example. Categories work for this example because it’s part of an ongoing series of posts.

Since the start of the year I have published a little bit of writing every week day. All of these posts have been filed under the same category, Personal. As the writing varies from day to day I find it hard to file it under a specific category. From tomorrow I am just going to stop categorising my writing. Why pigeon hole something when it won’t fit? It’s one of those small decisions that I can do without.

... once again. Proud and honoured to be featured in Kurt Harden's annual 25 blogs guaranteed to make you smarter again.

So Journalong has been tried and tested as a fully paid product, but I’m just not getting people using Journalong, so I’m moving the product towards a freemium product. The paid side of the service is still going to be $10 a year with all the trimmings, but the free service will be restricted in the settings that you can adjust. The free account will allow you to journal multiple times a day.

This isn’t the only change I’ll be making for Journalong in the next few weeks. It’s become apparent that writing with Journalong is somewhat restrictive due to the constraints of the textbox that you write in. It’s not focused and it’s only takes up so much of the page. What I really want is a full screen, no distractions, text entry. Just me and my journal entry.

The freemium changes will come in the next couple of weeks with the new journal entry screen to follow. It will be interesting to see if these changes can generate more interest in Journalong.​

... with Nicholas Bate.

My attempt to blog every weekday on my blog hit a snag today. I didn't have anything scheduled for today. No worries though. I'll simply start again from tomorrow and ensure that I always have a couple of articles in reserve for days where I just can't think of anything to write about.

... with everyone's favourite mentor, Nicholas Bate.

Ultimately we need to get big, get niche or get out. There are no magic recipes for success. But staying specialist, staying niche is close. And becoming generalist and starting to sell on price alone to compete is a road to self-destruction.

— Build a better business 4 by Nicholas Bate

Having multiple social networks can be a real headache if you're trying to manage them all at once. When I created my App.net profile and made that my new home, I stopped posting to Twitter for a few months. Also I have only just re-created a LinkedIn account in the last few months. Recently I have stuck with posting only to one network, but with Twitter and LinkedIn sitting in hibernation, I thought it might be a good idea to use them. With the freelancing way of working now in full swing, I am toying with the idea of using Twitter and LinkedIn to share updates to my availability for contracts and interesting links from the web development world.

Using these networks to market myself as a freelancer is a great way of using these networks without me just abandoning them for one network. The truth is that these days people are rarely exclusive members of one single network. I know there is people who share all their updates across all networks, but I think that is counterproductive. This can take up a lot of your time, especially when you start getting replies from different people on different networks.

What I will be doing is continually posting to App.net anything that I wish, but for my Twitter and LinkedIn accounts, I'll be sharing blog posts on freelancing, web development and availability as well as sharing interesting links on web development using Ruby and hopefully other languages. I'm getting the tools in place I need to make this happen, namely a Buffer account and perhaps some triggers setup on IFTTT if needed.

Hopefully this will result in more leads for freelancing work and also increase my reputation in these networks as a web developer who is passionate about what he does. We'll see how it goes.

I did try and build Journalong according to lean practices but at the end of the day I wanted something that I would be happy with and I have it. Next year I'll be adding more features to Journalong, but only if they make me happy as a user.

As a matter of fact, the first true user of any product will be its creator. It was then I concluded that once your product works well enough for you, you haven’t failed. Once it makes you happy, it’s a success.

— You are Your Number One User by Jared Erondu

... and everyone who wants a more productive year in 2013 is invited.

Curtis McHale's blog is definitely one to watch for 2013. His post on not selling your solution is a mistake I've seen too many people make including myself. The solution is simple:

To that end, sell yourself as a problem solver.

Thanks Curtis!

TechCube is a world class space for technology startups in Edinburgh. It provides affordable office space, services and community support for companies trying to tackle big problems. Situated two minutes’ walk from the University of Edinburgh and directly adjacent to the Meadows, TechCube is at the heart of Edinburgh’s rapidly developing startup scene.

— Scotland Opens First Privately Financed Incubator by The Wall Street Journal

It's great to see Scotland on the technology map once more. I'm really looking forward to see what TechCube produces in the next couple of years.

via Snook

... with Nicholas Bate.

Not surprised at all that so many corporate blogs are very rarely updated.

I've seen too many company blogs that are simply half-ass attempts are trying to keep them up to date. More worrying though is the number of company websites that don't even have a blog.

— 7 Reasons No One Reads Your Company Blog... by Successful Blog

via Cultural Offering

The bottom line: pick a few things to do well, do them, and don’t quit.

Great advice from Adam Keys.

Then check out Nicholas Bate.

... with Nicholas Bate.

Well I'm naming it this anyway.

Thanks E.

Yet again, I feel like NB is watching over my shoulder. Highly relevant for me given the circumstances.

... with Adam Keys.

No fancy hacks or software here. Just straight forward tips that anyone can do.

I've managed to write 3 posts over 3 days for my blog, but the writing well is running dry with ideas.Anybody want to see something on the blog that I haven't written about before? Contact me.

I've always had a side project going for the last few years. Whether it was a blog, a bit of code or some writing, there's always been something there for me to do. The reason why wasn't really clear to me until I read this:

The Grind is the problem that you beat yourself up over solving every single day. It’s the job you’re in, or the business you’re building. The Grind gets our best hours, our fullest attention, and the whole of our willpower.

Which leads me to the this question: If the company or organisation you work for allowed a percentage of time to work on side projects, would the grind become less of a grind?

— The Grind and Why We Need Side Projects by Rocketr

... that is every Twitter user at the moment.

A well written post by "love him or loathe him" DHH on how Twitter now amounts to nothing more than a corporate advertising stream backed by a ludicrous amount of funding.

That funding has to be paid back and unfortunately Twitter's users are the ones that are going to pay the price for it.

With every story like this I get closer and closer to deleting my account. I'm so close now to just hitting that 'Delete' button.

... to be featured in Kurt Harden's annual 25 blogs guaranteed to make you smarter.

... inside, outside and beyond the box. Lots of thinking with Nicholas Bate.

Sometimes I think NB is watching me from afar.

Start a new coffee shop that prides itself on not only making better tasting coffee and food and provides a better customer service, but also pays their UK taxes.

Barring a few replies out of common courtesy, it's now been three months since I stopped posting to my Twitter account and moved over to App.net. So what's the change of scene been like?

It's good to hang out some place else, and while I may not have the following that I had on Twitter, I'm happy to post here for the foreseeable future. App.net doesn't have the numbers that Twitter has, so at the moment I'm following most of the same people I follow on Twitter. Not many of these people are actively posting on App.net, but it's forcing me to consider following others that I might not have considered before. Not a bad thing really.

The big change though that sets App.net apart from Twitter is that there is no free account. Yip, this is a paid service that you are using and you're probably thinking that a service that doesn't have a free account would be restricting itself, but this is precisely why I like App.net. Not only does it ensure the healthy and continued development of a product paid for by its users (or customers if you prefer), it also provides a barrier that many people aren't going to cross.Twitter's free service means that anyone can sign up, and while that's all well and good for everyone, I'm not looking for a service that allows just anyone to connect with you.

The subscription fee that App.net charge ensures that there is little chance of accounts being created on the App.net network that currently pollute the Twitter network. Spam accounts, celebs and retail companies to name a few. I don't follow any of these type of accounts on Twitter, but knowing that there is little chance of these kind of accounts polluting the App.net network means that the quality of posts by it's users should remain higher and in turn be a much more interesting place to hang out.It's early days though, but I for one am enjoying my change of network.

Seriously, who can't write two sentences every day? That's all it takes to keep a journal for yourself going. Just two sentences. What's stopping you from keeping a journal?

Is $5 the magical number when it comes to pricing your product in the SaaS market?

Here's my current list of subscriptions:

• Github - $12
• Instapaper - $1
• The Magazine - $1.99

I have other subscriptions as well that are on an annual price that I haven't listed here, but it's safe to say that most subscriptions fall in and around the $5 mark. Don't just set a price though, do some background work on your product and market and get feedback on what your customers are prepared to pay. It might surprise you.

via Ahmet Alp Balkan

The FBO V3. Allows you to make notes from your books without writing in the margins of said books.

Jeff Atwood uses his brain, Curtis McHale has thrown away some of his list and I've completely deleted mine. Is this the end of the todo list?

This doesn’t mean new problems shouldn’t be tackled and new techonologies should not be invented. It applies mostly to reinventing wheels. That is, a project starts with level 1, not level 3 or 4. Apply a technology and improve it before you push the edge. In fact, you must push the limits of an extant technology before level 4 is the right answer. No skipping allowed.

— The Real Adam Invent The Right Thing by Adam Keys

A solution to a problem or level one according to Adam's post. That's how it all starts and that's how Journalong started. I needed a way to keep a journal in my Dropbox without needing a fancy app or special editor to write the journal entry.

I suppose you could say we're at level two at the moment based on Adam's levels. It integrates with Dropbox and uses it as a storage facility for your journal. As for level three, I don't think I'm at the stage where I can call Journalong a better journal than say Day One, but it's different. It's minimal. And that's what I wanted when I initially scratched the itch for a plain text journal.

Maybe one day, I'll take Journalong to level three, but for the moment it works and that's enough for now.

I gushed over the new Kindle Paperwhite when it was released a few weeks ago, however after reading Scott Hanselman's review of it, I'm glad I've not been able to buy one yet.

It's fine. OK, it's "fine." But let's be serious for a second. Every technology site is gushing about this device. They're saying this is the e-reader to end all e-readers. It's glorious, it's perfect. Friends, it's not. And this is from a Kindle Fan.

— Amazon Kindle Paperwhite 3G WiFi Review by Scott Hanselman

Read the rest of Scott's review if you're considering the Paperwhite. Scott goes into more details than many of the so-called technology sites.I can see me holding on to my Kindle Keyboard for as long as it's serving up my books. I too like the physical buttons for page turning and the keyboard does come in handy for taking notes on books (which I do a lot of). I don't know how I would get on with a button-less Kindle.

... with Nicholas Bate.

The trick, I think, is to make a better shared space for a remote/local team than the physically shared space they already have. A space that is just as fluid, fun, and useful as a physical space and
available anytime, everywhere is more compelling because it affords its occupants (aka team members)
more hours in their day (no commuting, flexible hours) and permits all sorts of non-traditional work locations (coffee shops, trains, sofas at home, a summer trip to Europe).

— A Better Shared Space by Adam Keys

Locking in your team to a particular time and place is a real constrain on getting the most from them. And it's not just about location and time. The way your team communicates over different locations and timezones is just as important.

Given the vast number of SaaS products on the market that allow teams to manage projects, clients and meetings, why do teams and companies find it so difficult to let go of the traditional "everyone in the office between 9 and 5"?

... a Blog Readership. Hats off to Dan Shipper for a great post on blogging. Definitely today's required reading.

... with Nicholas Bate.

One thing that has continually bugged me about the Journalong journal entry screen is the social widgets that I put on there. They serve no other purpose than to inform the user about how popular Journalong is within each social network. When you are about to write your daily journal entry, the last thing you want to see is the tweet count for Journalong.

I also believe it's a pointless measure of success and amounts to nothing more than a popularity poll. I'd like to think that the customers Journalong is attracting, base their decision to subscribe on getting value from a plain text journal they can write to from anywhere.

So last night I removed the social widgets from Journalong and it's already looking like a much nicer place now.

Lifehacker has all the resources you'll need for using Markdown.

There's hundreds of apps out there that are prepared to lock in your data. But why sacrifice access to your data? Look at moving away from these apps that lock in your data and start using plain old text files for your to do lists, logging, writing and blogging.

Plain text and Markdown is much more flexible and you can use a wider range of tools to manage all your Markdown documents. Add a cloud storage service like Dropbox and you can have your files with you everywhere you go!

The notes are for you. Don’t worry about your handwriting, the spelling, or what someone else will think. These are your notes. If a thought occurs to you, write it down, pat yourself on the back, and go about your business with a smile. Later you can leaf through your notes with a puzzled expression on your face until you stumble across that gem, that little something that has value, and feel the sense of relief and triumph.

— Scribble notes are nuggest of gold by Who Writes For You

Which is why I always carry my Moleskine everywhere with me.

... by Elliot Jay Stocks. Blog posts grouped together by year with a description for each year. Easy to find a post in the archive you've already read, but also good for finding interesting posts you haven't read yet.

via Curtis McHale

black.

via Nicholas Bate & Swiss Miss

More much needed career advice recommended by Nicholas Bate.

Muddy Waters and the Rolling Stones? It's definitely going on the wishlist. Thanks Rob!

via The Hammock Papers

via Fixed Gear Girl Taiwan

The Hammock Papers. Because you never know when you'll need the words to that naval song.

Dropbox just announced better plans. Really tempted to move a few more things to the cloud.

Nicholas Bate is at again. This time it's his winning career formula. You might want to mix some strategies for success in there as well.

I love reading posts like this. It's that moment when people wake up and say, "Fuck it. I'm doing things better from now on".

Be brutally honest with your self. Write about it and tell the world. Then just think about the first time someone asks you "How's that whole 'make things and be awesome' thing going?".

What are you going to answer with? I know what I would want to answer with.

And if you are struggling with your start-up and you're thinking of discounting then don't. NB has you covered:

via Nicholas Bate

This is just brilliant. Bicycle tools stored in your handlebars. It should fit all different types of bars including drop, track, risers and flat. More details at ideacious.

via core77

.. for anything. Take action with Nicholas Bate.

This image contains over 200,000 galaxies and yet this image only represents a small percentage of space. The numbers just boggle the mind.

via Discover Magazine

Another fine list from the man himself.

The next must have for any bike.

via Fixed Gear Girl Taiwan

Love the look of this bike.

via Fixed Gear Girl Taiwan

This is a great habit to get into, even if you're job or career doesn't demand much writing.

Starting your day as a producer means that your information consumption has
meaning: the rest of the day means consuming information that is relevant to what it is that you're producing. Waking up as a producer frames the rest of your habits.

— 500 words before 8am by Information Diet

There are those who do grow up. Discussions about coffee machines, hotel allowances and bonuses recede. The 'country club' atmosphere which has grown unhealthily in abundant times can be dropped quickly and a focused 'war room' mentality swung into action.

— On Growing Up and Rites of Passage by Nicholase Bate

Another insightful snippet from the master of business, Nicholas Bate.

I know it's not always this clear-cut, but it's sad to see so many businesses taking the easy option out and cutting costs (usually at the bottom of the company ladder) rather than exploring new revenue ideas and possibilities.

via blog.chasejarvis.com

Productive Brainstorming Requires that you Separate Creative Thinking from Critical Thinking

via thestartupdaily.com

I had first hand experience of this productive brainstorming at the weekend when I was collecting some ideas for a journalling application. The problem was that each idea I had was quickly followed through by my more critical side asking "How would that work?". As soon as I had an idea I would quickly invalidate it by thinking that it would be too difficult to implement. You're not going to get any ideas by doing this.

Looking back I should have simply put my ideas down first without giving them a second thought about how they would be implemented and then let them incubate.I do this quite a lot with a blog on mind mapping, but it's something that I had forgotten about at the weekend when I was trying to be creative and generate some ideas.Let your ideas grow in your mind for a while before applying the critical thinking to them.

I would recommend at least a few hours or even a couple of days between creative thinking and critical thinking.The time when your ideas are in an incubation period can give you a chance to reflect on your ideas. This isn't time when you should be thinking about the critical aspect of your ideas, instead it's just a time for the ideas you have, to sit and do nothing.While they're doing nothing you might trigger a thought to a more refined idea. Then again you might not.

You don't lose anything here but it does mean that when it comes to the critical evaluation of your ideas, you'll be familiar with each of the ideas you originally had and you'll be ready to apply some critical thinking to them.

Don't do it. Don't dabble with If only. Ban it from your vocabulary for 2012.

Play with if.

You know it makes sense.

— The Dark Side of If by Nicholas Bate

Nicholas Bate's post pretty much narrows down my review of 2011. I had a couple of ideas for products but didn't act on them. I spent way too much time dabbling, trying to learn and really didn't get anywhere. With some positive news at home, I can now focus on getting these ideas off the ground.