The Future of This Blog

Thinking of shifting the focus of this blog from a casual personal blog to a place where I share my thoughts on topics that dominate my mind like: technology, marketing, finance, and lifehacks. I'd like to have a place where I can flesh out my ideas on "paper" to share with the world.

What would that look like? Well, there would be more posts like this and less like this...see the difference?

Let me know your thoughts.

GTD Update

Last time I wrote about my Process slacking. I can now report that I'm on a weekly schedule I stick to. I process mainly on Sunday nights. I've found that now this is scheduled: I enjoy doing it, it's easy, and I actually look forward to it--which helps exponentially in motivating me to sit down and get started.

I now need to focus on two more things before I can claim to completly implement the GTD process. The first is that as stated, I'm not in love with my task collection list "FusionDesk" since it doesn't come with deadline alerts (that's extra as part of the paid package). The only way I'll be reminded of a deadline is if I open up the app and scroll through each project category. This is more manual than desired, and overall does not provide the satisfaction of knowing my GTD system prevents anything from slipping through the cracks. The only real option here is me forking out the $$ for the paid version I guess....ugh.

Next I want to explore D. Allen's 5 Horizons of Focus which live in the very back of his book, thus I haven't gotten to them and didn't even know they existed until I started reading "Making it All Work" his latest book (don't laugh, Enna) which emphasizes their importance. I'm curious about them. This will help me fully implement GTD so I'll add this to my reading list within the next month.

Next up, more reports on my GTD implementation and a post on my New Years Resolutions which I'm still finalizing. For a great resolution blog post check out Andrew Hyde's post here.

GTD is my New Shiney Toy. GTD is my Landmark Forum.

I've recently finished a brain dump and taken the first steps in converting my life over to the GTD system. GTD stands for "Getting Things Done" and is a productivity methodology based on Paul Allen's book of the same title. I've noticed that extremely productive people (my brother, and old boss, and Ramit Sethi a blogger I like) use the GTD system so I'm going to give it a try. I'm going to use this blog to track my progress since this will be a iterative process.
~
Now that I've had the system more or less in place for a month here are the challenges I'm dealing with that are holding me back from being in a "Mind like water" state.

Challenges:

• I'm not in love with my GTD desktop task management system FusionDesk. The biggest reason is that I don't find myself wanting to open it up and add a task, which is contradictory to how I feel about the other system I'm using for GTD, Evernote. I don't like FusionDesk mainly because the free version does not contain reminder functionality, so, I feel like the tasks I put in it go into a black hole unless I dig through and discover them. That's bad. I think I need to shell out the $90 for a license since I prefer FusionDesk over all the other GTD systems I've tried (on a PC...).
• I'm horrible at processing. I don't make time for it. I don't have a re-accuring time each week like I probably should to do this. Therefore things pile up in my inbox. This breaks the whole system. I need to set up one time each week to process. Maybe Sunday night? Sunday nights I'm always unpacking from the weekend...maybe Thursday mornings before work? 7am Thursday mornings? I'll try that, but that means I'll have to get up early each Thursday...see why this is hard?

Wins:

• I continue to be really good at the "capture" phase--I have a notepad and inbox system set up and I generally know where to place the odds and ends that enter my mind and my life. I've got this part of it down.
• I'm enjoying Evernote--I've created a notepad to keep all my odds and ends organized. It's also fun to use and share with other people. That's good.
• Mastered the filing cabinet thang--I redid my files combining two separate systems I had going into one, and it feels accesible and comprehensive. I can easily add new paper to it. Big win there. I can see myself refining this further by archiving all the folders that won't grow (for example I have files for old jobs that can be stored somewhere else).
• I feel more organized--Even though the system isn't firing on all cylinders, or whatever, I still feel the relief that came with my initial data dump. Mentally I've moved from around a "5" in feeling organized to a "7". I'd like to be at 10.

Next Steps

1. Figure out FusionDesk solution
2. Find a time to process 1x/week and stick to it...try a couple of different times and stick to the easiest
3. Archive "dead" folders, figure out a place they can go to die
4. Reassess in a month or so on this blog
   

My Learnings From iPhoneDevCamp 3

I’m a staff volunteer here at iPhoneDevCamp 3 this weekend down at Yahoo! trying to learn about my side interest creating iPhone apps. To me, this is an interesting space to watch since it’s a fresh, booming, and alluring new space ripe with opportunity.

With the lack of centralized metrics and monetization best practices in this space I’ve decided to post my small sample of my learnings here:

Game Apps (source: Tadow! guys)

• Less than 25% of people who download an app ever use it and within a few months less than 1% of people continue to use it
• 1 in 10 gamers will play an app more than 25 times
  

Monetize Your App (all source from Sunil Verma at Mobclix)

• Top 25 paid apps get 500-10,000 downloads a day
• 77% of all apps in the app store are paid (as opposed to free)
• If your app doesn’t get into the top 25 in the first week it probably never will
• Launch your app on Tuesday or Wednesday to seed user growth in order to increase chances you’ll get higher visibility over the weekend when app traffic is highest. Once your app has been approved Apple lets you choose launch date.
• If paid, consider buying ads on free apps similar to help drive traffic to yours
• Start your pricing high, then lower the price as needed
• Consider a launch strategy targeting very specific locals—the iTunes store has 88 different locations. This will allow you to target long tail and emerging market locales.
• To get to the coveted Top 25 the app must have a rating of 3.5 or above. Challenge: most users only take the time to rate apps if they have negative feedback.
• It helps to have a paid and a light version, but you must provide adequate incentive to upgrade. Ex: a game who’s light version only gives access to first 3 of 10 levels. 50% of light users convert to paid, and you can monetize using ads on the free light version.

General

• Lots of small iPhone development shops are springing up. Examples include: Dollar Apps, Small Society, Sugar Cube, and more.
• A iPhone developer for hire costs anywhere around $75-$150 an hour depending on the project

From the business perspective I’d expect to see some market leaders emerge from within the presently fragmented small app creation shops and possibly some acquisitions in the marketing/ad-server/analytics space by the larger "business optimization solutions” (ie: the large web analytics vendors Omniture and Coremetrics).

Other impressions of the weekend: there’s a wide variety of attendees here and my general take is that most of them don’t have an app in the store. Lots have ideas, hustle, and are looking to learn more. And then there are the familiar looking uber geeky conference junkies I won't get into here, because they are such bizarre examples of humanity they deserve another post entirely.

In conclusion, the paint’s still wet, the possibilities exciting, and as legendary Andy Stone said in his keynote we are, “Ready for the NeXT (same old) big thing”

Century Ride Training--Part 2

Yesterday I did a 51 mile ride in West Marin. Low mileage, I know. As Kathlyn put it, the Century Gods were conspiring against us: she went on a ride Saturday, got a flat, and had to hitch a ride back to SF due to a lack of tire irons. I was loading my bike into my car and pulled a back muscle leaving me able to ride, but in a fair amount of pain overnight and today. I feel like an old lady.

The good news: I averaged a little over 12 mph during the ride and it was pretty much a breeze. This is significant because I did the same ride a month ago and averaged about 10 mph and was brutally tired by the end. Not so this time. This progress is a welcome sign I was relieved to experience. Moreover, it was a gorgeous day and a delight to escape into the bucolic countryside for several hours of solitude.

Next up: I need to figure out a smart tapering strategy (which means to par down the miles you ride 2 weeks before a race in order to perform optimally on race day) which may be tricky due to the lack of miles I've put in thus far...

Also next, I'll need to figure out a heart rate strategy; this will help pace me on race day. I'm not sure what the best approach is, so will have to peruse the internets.

Also, also next--more icing!

I like this workspace for a couple of reasons:

...the way it's a clear seperate area within a bigger room, the smaller table on the side, the art that helps define the workspace, the desk size and color scheme.

Century Ride Training -- Part 1

Kathlyn and I started training for a century bike ride (a 100 mile supported ride) two months ago now, around mid August. We created a training schedule that gradually (at times...) ramps up the "long ride" we do each week during the weekend, when there's adequate time for such things.  

I'm proud to report that yesterday we did our longest ride yet--61 miles--from San Francisco to Santa Cruz on a gray, overcast, chilly day. It took a whooping 7.5 hours leaving us at an average of 8 miles/hr. That's s-l-o-w! In our defense, Kath was nursing a cold and I wasn't pushing it due to a hamstring pull from 2 weeks ago that I was still feeling. It's not worth getting injured even more! Note: that time also includes our crab melt lunch, and two other longer breaks to stretch and stuff our faces with Cliff Bars. 

If we were to do the Davis Century in that time it would take us 12.5 hours--waaaay too much time. We'll attempt to increase the speed next weekend in our West Marin 75 mile ride. Wish us luck!

~Santa Cruz Ride Summary~

Ride Highlights--the delicious lunch, watching good sets of waves come in outside of Santa Cruz, and meeting members of the band Blind Pilot who are biking, instruments towed behind them, to gigs down the entire coast of America. They were nice guys. 

Ride Lowlights--Feeling like the cars were too close on Ominous Devil's Slide, the constant car traffic in general through the ride, the cold, and miles 50-60.  

What I learned: 

Stef is amazing (duh) she met us at the finish line in Santa Cruz with a cold beer, poweraid, and a cupcake from Miete Bakery for me and drove us back to San Francisco. 

On cold mornings I should duc-tape the vents on my bike shoes shut so my feet don't go numb.

I should install my bike computer already, so I know how far we have to go and can pace better.

Save the breaks for the later half of the ride when the body needs it the most. 

Until next week...

Longboarding Down Tunnel Road, Berkeley, CA

Check out this video on longboarding in Claremont (right outside of Berkeley). Reminds me of the good old days when the Upset girls would skate down Old Tunnel Rd. I don't think we were going quite as fast, but the stoke was sure there.

Adam Kimmel presents: Claremont HD from adam kimmel on Vimeo.

200 on Twitter

I love that a community account I created is quickly growing on Twitter. This feeds from a longer story of how I found myself explaining to my fellow Surfrider volunteers what this "Twitter" thing was, and why it would be useful to help us communicate the latest news on the Cosco-Busan oil spill.

Soon after, @biz was nice enough to add a mention of it into a Twitter newsletter.

It's only grown from there.

All-in-all I'm happy to report my first Twitter follower goal was met today.

Proof of my Tartine Addiction