The Autumn of the Multitaskers
“Where do you want to go today?” asked Microsoft in a mid-1990s ad campaign. The suggestion was that there were endless destinations—some geographic, some social, some intellectual—that you could reach in milliseconds by loading the right devices with the right software. It was further insinuated that where you went was purely up to you, not your spouse, your boss, your kids, or your government. Autonomy through automation.This was the embryonic fallacy that grew up into the monster of multitasking.The Autumn of the Multitaskers A good article, take a looksee. It's not anti-Microsoft, there's just this part on the "Where do you want to go today?" ad. The article is about multitasking and why our brains really don't work that way. I'm reminded of all the silly arguments I've had with managers over the years about how "productive" "open pit" environments are where there are no cubicle walls and everyone just talks to everyone else on the team all the time. Bleargh!
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Tags: multitasking, attention, WalterKirn
“Where do you want to go today?” asked Microsoft in a mid-1990s ad campaign. The suggestion was that there were endless destinations—some geographic, some social, some intellectual—that you could reach in milliseconds by loading the right devices with the right software. It was further insinuated that where you went was purely up to you, not your spouse, your boss, your kids, or your government. Autonomy through automation.This was the embryonic fallacy that grew up into the monster of multitasking.The Autumn of the Multitaskers
A good article, take a looksee. It's not anti-Microsoft, there's just this part on the "Where do you want to go today?" ad. The article is about multitasking and why our brains really don't work that way. I'm reminded of all the silly arguments I've had with managers over the years about how "productive" "open pit" environments are where there are no cubicle walls and everyone just talks to everyone else on the team all the time. Bleargh!
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Tags: multitasking, attention, WalterKirn
It's official, I suck
I know, it's absurd, but I'm still sick. I just spent about four hours on work stuff and I feel like my brain is leaking out my ears. No fiction today either. God, I hope I'm better in time to get this silly thing done next week . . . .
I'm not as bad off as I was last Friday, but writing fiction is a high-function task for me. Even if I'm at about 80% of normal function, I can do some simple coding work, but not fiction. I tried yesterday to finish the story, but I just don't have the energy for yet. Sorry everyone!
I know, it's absurd, but I'm still sick. I just spent about four hours on work stuff and I feel like my brain is leaking out my ears. No fiction today either. God, I hope I'm better in time to get this silly thing done next week . . . .
I'm not as bad off as I was last Friday, but writing fiction is a high-function task for me. Even if I'm at about 80% of normal function, I can do some simple coding work, but not fiction. I tried yesterday to finish the story, but I just don't have the energy for yet. Sorry everyone!
I'm not as bad off as I was last Friday, but writing fiction is a high-function task for me. Even if I'm at about 80% of normal function, I can do some simple coding work, but not fiction. I tried yesterday to finish the story, but I just don't have the energy for yet. Sorry everyone!
Sorry guys
I hate to do this again. Really, really hate to do this again. But I got the creeping crud this week, and at the moment I get about an hour of 80% brain functionality, then a headache and hopefully a multi-hour nap. So I (pathethically, sadly) still haven't finished the next part of Shore Leave. Mea culpa!
I hate to do this again. Really, really hate to do this again. But I got the creeping crud this week, and at the moment I get about an hour of 80% brain functionality, then a headache and hopefully a multi-hour nap. So I (pathethically, sadly) still haven't finished the next part of Shore Leave. Mea culpa!
The Macworld Analysis
So what do I think about the new Macworld announcements? A lot of good stuff overall, but I think only one thing that for me is a will-buy.
- iTunes Rentals. Shrug. The marketplace wants this I think. I don't think I do. I guess I MIGHT rent a movie and throw it on my iPod before a plane flight. But I'm much more likely to rip a DVD. Still, almost certainly a big deal for iTunes. In theory I have this already on my 360 and I don't ever use it.
- Apple TV 2. Meh. I think it's a nice bit of kit overall, but it doesn't seem to offer anything over a Mac Mini connected to the TV. (Actually, according to Daring Fireball the HD rentals are only on Apple TV, likely due to HDCP issues.) Since I've already moved Horton into the living room I don't see buying an Apple TV. Still, nice price drop and it seems like a good feature set if you don't want a Mac Mini for some reason or another.
- iPhone & iPod Touch Update. Well, nothing that makes me scream "Oh, NOW I need an iPhone." Seems like good stuff, but until the iPhone has the SDK, a working To-Do list and some sort of reasonable note-taking functionality then it's still not for me. Anything else is just unneeded glitter.
- Time Capsule. Oh yes please. I'll almost certainly pre-order one of these in the next few days. Fantastic upgrade to the Airport Extreme and it's a great price. I'll convert all the machines to using a 1TB version for Time Machine and use the current TM drives for more capacity. And this makes Time Machine something useful for a laptop.
- MacBook Air. This is the tricky one. I've come to the conclusion that I don't really like the 17" form factor - it's just too damn big. The number of times I'm excited by all the screen space is overwhelmed by the amount of time I find it too big to use on the train or a plane, or even just a pain to carry around. I thought I really wanted one until I realized they hadn't said *anything* about the graphics chip. There's a reason for it - it's crap. A fair tradeoff I suppose, but it won't run World of Warcraft or Spore. Heck, I sort of doubt it would even run Warcraft III very well, but maybe that would be OK. One primary reason I'd like to upgrade Kool-Aid would be to get the ability to code in Windows, and I probably want at least a half-decent graphics chip for that. On the other hand that kicks me all the way over to a 15" MacBook Pro at almost double the weight and about 38% more cost. This is not unreasonable - if I'm going to try to claim I want to code on my laptop saying "Well get the damn MBP then" is more than reasonable. But still . . . . The bigger problem is that the new wider "gesture-enabled" trackpad on the Air looks awesome. I'd certainly want that on any laptop I was buying moving forward. I think I'm not quite the target market for the Air, but I'll probably hold off for a Pro refresh to the new trackpad before buying. But damn it's a sexy piece of hardware!
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So what do I think about the new Macworld announcements? A lot of good stuff overall, but I think only one thing that for me is a will-buy.
- iTunes Rentals. Shrug. The marketplace wants this I think. I don't think I do. I guess I MIGHT rent a movie and throw it on my iPod before a plane flight. But I'm much more likely to rip a DVD. Still, almost certainly a big deal for iTunes. In theory I have this already on my 360 and I don't ever use it.
- Apple TV 2. Meh. I think it's a nice bit of kit overall, but it doesn't seem to offer anything over a Mac Mini connected to the TV. (Actually, according to Daring Fireball the HD rentals are only on Apple TV, likely due to HDCP issues.) Since I've already moved Horton into the living room I don't see buying an Apple TV. Still, nice price drop and it seems like a good feature set if you don't want a Mac Mini for some reason or another.
- iPhone & iPod Touch Update. Well, nothing that makes me scream "Oh, NOW I need an iPhone." Seems like good stuff, but until the iPhone has the SDK, a working To-Do list and some sort of reasonable note-taking functionality then it's still not for me. Anything else is just unneeded glitter.
- Time Capsule. Oh yes please. I'll almost certainly pre-order one of these in the next few days. Fantastic upgrade to the Airport Extreme and it's a great price. I'll convert all the machines to using a 1TB version for Time Machine and use the current TM drives for more capacity. And this makes Time Machine something useful for a laptop.
- MacBook Air. This is the tricky one. I've come to the conclusion that I don't really like the 17" form factor - it's just too damn big. The number of times I'm excited by all the screen space is overwhelmed by the amount of time I find it too big to use on the train or a plane, or even just a pain to carry around. I thought I really wanted one until I realized they hadn't said *anything* about the graphics chip. There's a reason for it - it's crap. A fair tradeoff I suppose, but it won't run World of Warcraft or Spore. Heck, I sort of doubt it would even run Warcraft III very well, but maybe that would be OK. One primary reason I'd like to upgrade Kool-Aid would be to get the ability to code in Windows, and I probably want at least a half-decent graphics chip for that. On the other hand that kicks me all the way over to a 15" MacBook Pro at almost double the weight and about 38% more cost. This is not unreasonable - if I'm going to try to claim I want to code on my laptop saying "Well get the damn MBP then" is more than reasonable. But still . . . . The bigger problem is that the new wider "gesture-enabled" trackpad on the Air looks awesome. I'd certainly want that on any laptop I was buying moving forward. I think I'm not quite the target market for the Air, but I'll probably hold off for a Pro refresh to the new trackpad before buying. But damn it's a sexy piece of hardware!
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Conversion efforts and this week's story
No, I didn't post a story on Friday. Yes, I'm still working on it.
Turns out that this "Oh, I'll have to patch up a few entries here and there" logic is flawed. I don't know why I'm surprised, but Google is slowly crawling the entire (old) site so I keep getting emails about the 404's to MT-style links. It had been 2-3 a day from Google but then yesterday it got all excited and sent me 54 missing links. I sat down planning to work on the story, but just spent a couple of hours writing the .htaccess file to fix them all. Still hundreds left I suppose, but a lot more entries work now. The CityDesk archives are available, though there's no sidebar link yet. Random pre-Flickr pictures are available as well.
No, I didn't post a story on Friday. Yes, I'm still working on it.
Turns out that this "Oh, I'll have to patch up a few entries here and there" logic is flawed. I don't know why I'm surprised, but Google is slowly crawling the entire (old) site so I keep getting emails about the 404's to MT-style links. It had been 2-3 a day from Google but then yesterday it got all excited and sent me 54 missing links. I sat down planning to work on the story, but just spent a couple of hours writing the .htaccess file to fix them all. Still hundreds left I suppose, but a lot more entries work now. The CityDesk archives are available, though there's no sidebar link yet. Random pre-Flickr pictures are available as well.
Turns out that this "Oh, I'll have to patch up a few entries here and there" logic is flawed. I don't know why I'm surprised, but Google is slowly crawling the entire (old) site so I keep getting emails about the 404's to MT-style links. It had been 2-3 a day from Google but then yesterday it got all excited and sent me 54 missing links. I sat down planning to work on the story, but just spent a couple of hours writing the .htaccess file to fix them all. Still hundreds left I suppose, but a lot more entries work now. The CityDesk archives are available, though there's no sidebar link yet. Random pre-Flickr pictures are available as well.