Word on the street (WSJ) is that Google is in talks to buy YouTube for about 1.6 billion. This will be Google’s largest acquisition to date. Not bad for the YouTube guys, considering they’re just about a year and half old (Feb 2005). Looks like Mark Cuban will have to eat his words.
via Drudge
The American Association of Kidney Patients sent me an update today with one article that suggests 4 shorts walks per day actually do more to keep blood pressure lower than one long walk. I try to walk several days a week. It’s good for me and gives me a few minutes to think. But I like the idea of dividing it up into four shorter walks. For my schedule, it would be easier to do this every day rather than my tendency to walk about 3 or 4 days a week now.
Sick of working? Take a mental health day, using Call-In-Sick.
Here’s their spiel:
Call-in-Sick is a revolutionary new FREE service that allows you to call in your sick message to your boss or employer from anywhere, any time.
Picture the scenario: You stay out too late on a workday night and decide to call in sick the next day. The next day you drag
yourself out of bed at 5am because you know your boss won’t be there to answer the phone.
With Call-in-Sick you can record your sick message the night before then schedule it to be sent directly to your boss’s phone early in the morning without you even getting out of bed!
Nathaniel, one of my co-workers, sent this to me via Mike Yamamoto. Maybe nobody is buying my kidney transplant excuses and want me to come up with something fresh!
NYT announced today that Netflix is offering a $1 million dollar prize for the person who can improve their recommendation system by at least 10 percent. To help potential winners, they’re making available “to the public 100 million of its customers’ movie ratings, a database the company says is the largest of its kind ever released.”
I think this is pretty cool. It is more of the consumer generated content trend where companies look outside their walls to the public for help in creating solutions.
There’s only one political race that I’ve been following this year and that is the Lieberman-Lamont showcase showdown. And the only reason is that I think Lieberman is a decent guy that was completely hung out to dry on the basis on one issue. So I was delighted to read this little article on Lieberman today in The Stanford Daily.
I don’t normally mention politics here simply because our culture has moved far beyond any form of reasoned discourse or proper rhetoric. I think many of us Americans are not on the fringe waiting and wanting to virtually crucify the “other guy.”
There are real problems in our world and real disagreements as to how to solve those problems. If we could ever learn to listen and really dialogue (Martin Buber), we might actually find places of wisdom that teach us to avoid killing each other (virtually or literally).
Lifehacker posted some great free education resources. This excites me because I have so much to learn.
When I graduated from college, I thought I was pretty smart. By the time I graduated from Graduate school (’94), I realized that I was completely ignorant. Since that time, I’ve been trying to catch up but it sure feels like I’m getting dumber as the years go by. So there may be no hope!
But who knows, maybe Lifehacker combined with The Teaching Company may at least keep me from fading into total illiteracy.
Apparently YouTube is getting ready to be sued into oblivion. At least that’s what Mark Cuban believes. According to Reuters,
“There is a reason they haven’t yet gone public, they haven’t sold. It’s because they are going to be toasted,” said Cuban, who has sold start-ups to Yahoo Inc. and CompuServe.
Dang! I was just starting to like YouTube. One minute they’re the fastest growing video sharing site in the world and the next minute they’re a burned up piece of bread from yesterday’s breakfast.
I actually think there’s potential to find a way to keep the irreverent and diverse user-generated content while still making peace with copyright holders and even welcome more commercial entities.
Well here’s hopin’ Cuban is just showboatin’ and the zany world of YouTube keeps growing and shocking.
My wife sent me a great Fast Company article on how several top tech executives manage their the overwhelming schedules. You can visit the article to read their stories, but if you want the bullets, here’s the skinny:
1. One size does not fit all. Cingular Wireless CEO Stephen Carter handles almost every incoming email in real time; Sun Microsystems EVP Marissa Peterson checks email just twice a day. When it comes to multitasking, no single solution works for everyone. Pick the tactic that’s best for you.
Doug Comments – I’m an NF, and I don’t know if this is true for all NFs but I cannot even follow the same process for extended periods. It helps me to change the way I do things every so often, or I feel like I get into a creative rut.
2. Paper piles only grow. When you get a paper report or memo, deal with it, then file it or hand it off. Piles of paper make for more work.
Doug Comments – My wife is an organizer, so I’ve heard this for almost twenty years! But I love stacks and stacks of paper and stacks and stacks of books careless thrown about on my desk. It’s not about a method for processing that info: I try to deal with stuff ASAP or flag in email so I will remember. But if I am working on a project, I need the clutter to help me create. Otherwise, I feel as blank as the desk.
3. Heading to a meeting? Go unplugged. When you meet with someone, you’re using a nonrenewable resource: your time. Don’t let cell-phone or pager interruptions waste it.
Doug Comments – Totally on board with this. I do not answer my phone when I am in conversation or meetings. The person in front of me receives top priority. The Amish have a handle on this. One reason they seem to reject technology is the destructive impact it can have on community. So a phone cannot be in the house because it will interrupt the importance of the people who are present (think: answering the phone during supper). There is one exception for me: the wife! Once we were at Walmart and I was talking with an old friend. My phone buzzed and buzzed and buzzed and buzzed, but I completely ignored it and focused on my friend. Suddenly my wife appeared. After looking for me for about twenty minutes, she was a minor bit frustrated. I learned my lesson: she takes priority!
4. The next killer business app? Instant messaging. IM is faster than email and just as inclusive. Its beauty lies in its simplicity. Think of it as the online equivalent of an elevator conversation.
Doug Comments – During the day, I work online all day: this is my contact point of choice!
5. Delegate: It’s the ultimate time-saver. Investing in frequent communications with your staff — lunch meetings, daily emails — yields big dividends. Your staff members can’t lighten your load if they’re out of the loop.Doug Comments – Good. In my ministry world, I am trying to learn this.
6. Working in hard-to-reach territories? Voice-mail it. Voice mail is more dependable than email and better for keeping globe-trotting executives emotionally connected with the home team.
Doug Comments – If you need to talk with them, make sure to leave times and phone number, when you are available to avoid the dang phone tag wars.
Amazon has added a comment functions on reviews. Users can comment on reviews, and then police comments. I will be interesting to see how well this takes off.
Yipes. Jeremy went to Disney on Ice last night. Disney is certainly not a member of the culture of generosity!
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