You really must spend 10 minutes reading this very thoughtful article
from Clayton Christensen:

http://hbr.org/2010/07/how-will-you-measure-your-life/ar/1

I'm making this as a personal, rather than business, recommendation.

It's free.

Clarke

If you click on this link: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/amazon/7929091/Amazon-opens-UK-Kindle-store.html you'll read an article on the UK's Telegraph newspaper about the new Kindle store opening in the UK.

Scroll down a little and you'll see a link at the bottom of the article which says Buy the Amazon Kindle from Amazon.co.uk.

If you look closely, the link url looks like this: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B002Y27P46?ie=UTF8&tag=telegraphcouk-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=19450&creativeASIN=B002Y27P46.

I don't know ... but does the "tag-telecgraphcouk-21" mean that the if I buy a kindle (and maybe even a kindle book, or maybe even any product) after visiting that page .... does the Telegraph get a commission?

If they do then I'm guessing they've just crossed an awkward commercial / editorial boundary.  

So far no one has heeded my call to bring back Magnum PI.  While I'm waiting I have a couple of requests.

First, do you remember a really cool app you could get on your PC in a about 1995 where little sheep walked around the windows on your screen?  I think it may have been a screen saver.  It was probably one of THE best things I've ever seen a computer do.  It kinda makes the iPhone look feeble.  Any idea what it was called or if there's a modern version of it?

Second, way back in 1992 I saw some ascii art with cows on it.  I've not seen art like it since.  Any ideas how to find it?

You no doubt recall that one of my favourite books ever is Chip and Dan Heath's Made to Stick.  If you liked that book then I've got good news for you: their new book Switch, is fantastic too.  Go buy it.

http://www.amazon.com/Switch-Change-Things-When-Hard/dp/0385528752/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1281033425&sr=8-1

In the last few months I've read the book once and listened to the audio book 4 times.  Each time I listen to it I like it even more.  It is a keeper.  Which is a good thing because it took me a while to warm to it.  

The first time I read it I was bored at work with not a lot to do and very little immediate need for a well written book on change.  More recently, though, I've not been bored at work and I'm in the middle of a change effort where I have little authority. And that's precisely what the book is about.  Every time I listen I get sparks - maybe one ever 10 minutes - in my brain saying either "yes, yes, that explains a lot" or "oh boy, never thought of that", "I've heard that before ... but not quite put in that way" or "okaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay, let me think about for a while".

I started reading and studying marketing & selling & change about 10 years ago when I realized that I was man full of good ideas but with no idea how to get others interested in them.  I got stuck at work because I couldn't figure out how to make my ideas stick.  So I've spent a lot of effort at getting better in that area (hint: the MBA helped in terms of credibility, but not much in terms of skills; writing a blog and writing articles helped enormously; finding two things I'm passionate about - Agile, TOC - and deciding I needed to let the world know more about them was key).   So I've read and practiced a lot of the "change literature" over the last decade.  There wasn't all that much new for me in Switch ... but the way it was presented was what did it for me.  Lots of stories.  Lots of deliberate repetition.  Lots of little, profoundly simple, nuggets, with no unnecessary words.  Oh, and the guy who read the audio book has a great voice.

If you're in a similiar position to what I was then buy and then read and read and read both of the Heath books.  

Does Amazon maybe have too many ways to provide feedback?

This would be easier to explain face to face and I could point at the screen.

Take a look at this: http://www.amazon.com/review/R39AXJMKKO2WE5/ref=cm_cr_pr_cmt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=1422110664&nodeID=#wasThisHelpful

It's a comment, on a customer review of the book The Power of Positive Deviance.  

I found the 1st comment (by Mobster 94) intriguing.  The commenter gave the review a "was not helpful" vote and then left a reason to explain why.  I've not seen that before.  The reason surprised me too - the commenter thought the review was too long even though it was well written.  Never seen that before.

So, here you've got 4 different types of feedback: 

1) A review

2) A vote on whether the review is useful

3) A comment explaining why the commenter thought the review wasn't useful.

4) A comment from the reviewer suggesting that the commenter reads other people's reviews instead

And now, a 5th and 6th, which came from me clicking Yes, then No, on (3) and (4) above to Amazon's question "Do you think this post adds to the discussion?"

I tried out the new dragon dictation iphone app last week and WOW it worked well, even with my kiwi accent.  The app is small and simple with  the grunt work on Dragon's servers.  I don't think I'll use the app but it is an impressive piece of work - and free.

But ... here's the really clever bit: according to David Pogue's latest NYTimes article, Dragon have been anonymously saving the iphone data on its servers and then using inside their development process to improve the software's accuracy. I like that: provide something free that is useful to non-customers so that you can improve your product for new customers. Nifty.

This time, an animation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcz1aZ60k7w clarke ching

This time, an animation: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcz1aZ60k7w

Earlier this week I spend a fascinating 75 minutes talking with James Cox and John Schleier, the co-editors of the newly published TOC handbook.

Download the podcast (or subscribe) here: http://clarkeching.libsyn.org/index.php?post_id=631796

It's a fantastic piece of work.

clarke ching

Click http://www.blameitonthevoices.com/2010/07/pig-prank.html to see the following game suggestion properly.  It's quite clever.

 

Click http://www.blameitonthevoices.com/2010/07/pig-prank.html to see the following game suggestion properly. It's quite clever. clarke ching

Someone - I don't know who - should bring back Magnum PI. I don't mean a remake like they've done with the A-Team or Starsky and Hutch. I mean, bring it back pn the telly with Tom Selleck just awr... clarke ching

Someone - I don't know who - should bring back Magnum PI.  I don't mean a remake like they've done with the A-Team or Starsky and Hutch.  I mean, bring it back pn the telly with Tom Selleck just awr in 2010, 25 years later.  Sure, Higgons is dead and so is TC, but Selleck isn't and he was the meat.

Are you with me?

Yesterday my wife and I took the kids on a surprise stay-over holiday in Glasgow. I found a fantastic little guesthouse on laterooms.com. It has just opened and was trying to attract some cash-flow & positive Internet reviews by offering... clarke ching

Yesterday my wife and I took the kids on a surprise stay-over holiday
in Glasgow. I found a fantastic little guesthouse on laterooms.com.
It has just opened and was trying to attract some cash-flow & positive
Internet reviews by offering a solid discount. It was just two doors
down from the famous surgeon Lister's house. (He discovered that when
surgeons washed their hands and their patents wounds with carbolic
acid before they operated then the patients tended not to die from
septicaemia after surgery - the survival rate was previously about
50%. The mouthwash was named after him although I suspect he was long
dead by then - and rolling in his grave).

We got a suite with a huge kingsize bed at one end and an enormous
couch which folded out into a sofa bed at the other end. We had an
early dinner, put the kids to bed around 8 then watched two episodes
of the West Wing before retiring. Series 7 is just as good NOW as the
early series even though it didn't seem that way first time around.

So. The iPhone. It came in handy when I couldn't sleep and wanted to
read a book on my Kindle but my wife wanted to turn the light off so
she could sleep. If you don't already know the Kindle is line a book
in that it needs an external light source. I suggested to my wife
that if she was as tired then surely she could sleep with the light on
but that apparently isn't the case.

I briefly regretted not buying an iPad since it is backlit. But it
was too late for that.

Enter the iPhone at last.

Inspiration hit and I downloaded the flashlight app then lay on my
back with the iPhone on my chest as I held the kindle above it. That's
right. I used my expensive iPhone like a nightlight. It's a mediocre
flashlight at best but I got an hours extra reading out of it. Better
than staring at the ceiling not sleeping for an hour.

That's the second time I've used the flashlight app to get out of a
jam. It is surely the most useful thing about the iPhone.

Okay, so I don't know what a split infinitive is but I do know it's a bad, bad thing. I also know that I'm not good at spelling or grammar. I'm also a bit lazy when it comes to proof... clarke ching

Okay, so I don't know what a split infinitive is but I do know it's a bad, bad thing.

I also know that I'm not good at spelling or grammar.

I'm also a bit lazy when it comes to proof reading and correcting.

And then, even when I do proof read, I still get things wrong.  Especially when I'm blogging from my iphone.

That's what copy-editors are for.

I've given up trying.

In honour of the new Toy Story movie and as a form of self mockery I've renamed my blog "Clarke Ching - Split Infinitives and Beyond".

I was going to put spell "infinitives" as "infinitive's" but I didn't.

Now, a question: have I, by pure ironic chance, included any split infinitives in this particular blog?

Andy Grove, writing in bloomberg, asks: “what kind of a society are we going to have if it consists of highly paid people doing high-value-added work -- and masses of unemployed?” “I fled Hungary as a young man in 1956... clarke ching