Digital Swarm Behavior

Posted on January 10, 2011 by Slava
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Thought this was interesting: Digital Swarm Behavior

In general, I keep waiting for a new set of paradigms for “everyone to be talking about” to emerge.

The candidates I hear about are:

  • “social graph”, as in “facebook rules the social graph”
  • “big data” – alright, this one is pretty much a common phrase by now
  • “internet scale” – common in tech circles, but I think will make a jump into mainstream reporting soon

I also liked how the article was written, especially when compared to something like Is Your Enterprise Socially-Networked or Just Your Employees which was nearly incomprehensible, and pretty boring when actually parsed.

The latter was just… lame. And what’s up with capitalizing all Your Words In A Title?

ps. I am not sure what it is today with all the “” this and CAP that for me. apologies.

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2010 Old Year – Resolutions

Posted on December 31, 2010 by Slava

One of the nice things about Dec 31st, is that no one will read anything you write. So I can safely list out all the things I wanted to write about, and it is almost as if I wrote about them – except no one will steal the ideas (which are worthless anyway).

So here are some themes I had thought of writing, but unlike my friend Lenny Zeltser – did not create a post every day.

  • Technology does help to keep in touch. Sure human nature has not changed and we still have limited number of connections we can make to people. But keeping in touch has never been easier, and I know that is making a huge difference in people’s lives. I am having a hard time understanding what difference it might make in my kids’ lives, but I am sure it will be profound.
  • I spent the last few months trying to be better organized. That effort paid off well, but only on small scale tasks and projects. For anything bigger than a short email or a phone call, a different approach to dividing/using time is really needed. Personally, I wish more techniques for “getting things done” were taught in school – instead of a lot of “teach to test” junk time is being wasted on.
  • I have become very interested in “technology-driven businesses”. So my attempts to make sure the organization I work for is truly technology-driven have not gotten the results I hoped for – but that’s what 2011 is for!
  • There are lots of stories about people losing their jobs because of technology. Descriptions of their jobs and experiences are fascinating, but the march of time and change is relentless. I am waiting for my own work to be looked at in same nostalgic fashion, “we had to look at output from memory in gc and use probes to determine values at different memory locations”.
  • USA is being out-trained and out-educated has been a common theme in 2010. I have a lot of thoughts on whether it is true, and how I keep thinking this trend could be reversed. While possible, I am not optimistic that USA as a country is in a right place for such a major change. I am hoping I am wrong. Otherwise, “Super Sad True Love Story”-style future is coming fast.

That’s all for now folks. Got to buy some champaign and cognac. All set with scotch.

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Thinking about Shadow Scholar

Posted on December 6, 2010 by Slava
Classical ideal feedback model. The feedback i...
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Came across The Shadow Scholar article in the Chronicle of Higher Education today. I cannot say I was disturbed by the article; one assumes these things happen all the time (and have happened since time immemorial). As in many similar online discussions, comments are the best part, my favorite was #341. (I would not be surprised if the country of the poster is Russia, but it does not really matter).

Any discussion of education for me really bogs down on the simple question – what is the goal – for particular society – of the education process. And it is a process in a system – with its feedback loops, homeostasis, and other systemic attributes- constantly seeking equilibrium and responding to stimuli and events. As long as the equilibrium of producing 100 degree holders in order to produce one actual degree-worthy candidate is satisfactory to our society, arguing about sharing blame between college administrators and professors is a bit besides the point.

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Quick post – Review guide for Lotus Connections 3

Posted on November 12, 2010 by Slava

For those interested in some enterprise social software – this is a prime example.

Lotus Connections 3 Reviewers Guide

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-11-07

Posted on November 7, 2010 by Slava
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Door handles – color tells the tale

Posted on November 4, 2010 by Slava

How do you know who are your office Connectors? Whose door gets opened and closed dozens of time a day? Would you care if you knew?

A lot of highfaluting and important-sounding stuff gets written about office culture, team building, and other human resources buzzwords. I like to think that as much – or more – can be found in small clues left around by the people themselves. A desk with a pile of printouts covering 3 old laptops and 5 coffee cups on it tells you as much about the person as his resume would. At least as much.

But I digress. A similar clue struck me as I walked around offices a little  while ago, late in the evening. It was quiet – everyone had gone home and I had a thorny problem to solve. As I walked the office perimeter, trying to think, I realized that new carpet and paint brought out the wear-and-tear of the doors – specifically door handles.

When I looked at these handles, I actually knew immediately which offices they belonged to – and thought the amount of wear and tear on them made perfect sense given the occupants.

What’s my point? As people decorate and redecorate their offices, fight for team improvement and cohesion, alignment, productivity – they should not forget that in the end there are human beings sitting inside these offices. And so if they find a worn out handle on someone’s door – do not replace it, just quietly give the guy (or gal) a raise.

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Lost sale – a tale of a forgotten password

Posted on November 3, 2010 by Slava

“Online interactions should mimic real-life experiences as much as possible”

– from a Colleague’s conference abstract

With all the talk about customer/user experience, businesses sometimes forget that ALL interactions matter, and that friction built in any phase of the transaction will slow down the momentum. Having 1-click shopping experience is great, but not when there is no way to reset a password and complete a sale in the time already mentally allotted for it.

Recently, for example, I was about to buy shoes from Zappoes.com, since I figured it would be easiest for me for to just reorder the last pair of shoes I bought there. With as many account we have nowadays, and different security requirements, I could not remember the password and had to request a reset. A common enough occurrence, I suppose. I find it strange that Zappoes can get shoes to me, if I could order them, faster than they got the password reset email to my Inbox. Like many consumers, I am willing to wait 5 or 10 minutes for such an email, but when it does not arrive – I am forced (forced, I tell you!) to go to Plan B. In this case Amazon won the day. It took me a few extra clicks to locate my desired pair of shoes – but at least I could get in and buy.

So a kind reminder to online merchants – I suspect you lose a sale for every 10 minutes password reset is not done. And every such lost sale is totally unnecessary. If you are not sure how long your site takes to reset a password – go and test it now, do not put it off till tomorrow when more of your sales are going to Amazon, which is one site users do remember their passwords.

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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-10-31

Posted on October 31, 2010 by Slava
  • Business partner day at #iod2010 Starting of with a huge slide of companies IBM bought. #
  • Overheard in a lobby. "If something is really personal, I only put it on facebook." new normal, i guess. #
  • 1 of 3 CEOs feel that they make decisions based on incomplete information. Only 1 in 3? I'm pretty sure it is 3 in 3. #iod2010 #
  • Crowd-forcing is what happens when crowd-sourcing gets out of control. #
  • ADP tells a great analytics story. Hope there will be a video for later. #iodgc #
  • Which booth has info on db2 time travel? And cognos+lotus connections integration? #iodgc #
  • if i hear "doing more with less" again… It's like a drinking game for data alcoholics at #ibmgc #
  • Serious money for Internet access #iodgc http://yfrog.com/n8lddbj #
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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-10-24

Posted on October 24, 2010 by Slava
  • Amnh explored app is super helpful. Especially with kids in tow. Amnh.org/apps #
  • What a great post! http://bit.ly/ctBBiJ – overview of possible futures for living room TV+content+apps+second screen #
  • Dear verizon, giving me a connection troubleshooting app which does not work with your router is not nice. #fail #
  • hat tip @arkady_n Timeless: Coney Island's Cast of Thousands, as Seen by Weegee – http://nyti.ms/auumzD #
  • Didn't realize pressing power+home on iPhone takes a screenshot. So useful. #
  • Great ode to mechanical keyboards. http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2010/10/the-keyboard-cult.html. #
  • Don't say cognos, say cogyes. #
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Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-10-17

Posted on October 17, 2010 by Slava
  • So they take "sponsored" route RT @lennyzeltser Google testing self-driving cars : http://goo.gl/qnOb #
  • Evernote iphone client has a tiny problem with email – it does not search through address books. Annoying slip for such an awesome product #
  • Things for Mac are great-looking, but not having integration with Email pushes me back into ActiveInbox camp. And no web-synch? #
  • very polished RT @LotusKnows: Pleasing customers is the cornerstone of an exceptional Web experience … YouTube http://bit.ly/dg0nmt #
  • just discovered snapengage. What a cool product. #
  • from discussion today, "It is one thing to eat 'your own dog food', it is another to eat someone else's" #gladisaidit #
  • mint apologizes for spam, that's nice – but did it really take them a week to figure out what was causing it? that's what is bothering me. #
  • Mutltiple tasklists and apps just means there are more places were you are behind. #
  • great quote: "If you're gonna be stupid, you gotta be tough." (in a comment thread about poor financial decisions) http://mee.bo/ajKDzO #
  • citibank – you rock! you let me reorder checks – but won't tell me what they look like or how much they COST. Call 800# for that? #fail #
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