The Jewels of SXSWi
Web Design • March 16th, 2007South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) is getting mixed reviews this year. My personal opinion? The 2007 conference was not as good as past years, but it still managed to leave me with several interesting nuggets of inspiration. Rob Foster, one of the guys with whom I went to Austin this year, has posted a very good article on what he thinks went wrong. I can’t agree more with him, and wish that those who made mistakes will pay more attention to the criticism of those who attended, and less to the fanatic praise and blind pats on the back from fans who stayed. So, in respect for my largely non-geeky audience, I won’t attempt to articulate the reason why I found several panels as a royal waste of my time. Instead, I’ll do like Dave Seah and focus on the positive, and share with you the few non-geeky gems I was able to extract after four days of panels.
Gem #1. Kathy Sierra Always Rocks
This is the second time I hear Kathy Sierra speak. I was glad to see that she didn’t repeat her “Passionate Users” presentation (highly recommend it, by the way, if you ever have a chance to get it). Instead, this one felt more like a sequel building on top. Although important portions of her message live in the presentation slides, I still think that hearing the podcast of this presentation could leave you with very interesting thoughts. Kathy talked about one of the human aspects that gets lost in the interaction with computers. That is: the ability to express confusion and receive immediate feedback. Computers can’t tell when we are confused, and FAQs and Help content rarely help all the way. Instead, Kathy introduces the idea of the WTF button.
Gem #2. Leveraging Your Short Attention-Span
I actually came a little late to this one as I was patiently waiting for the panel I was at to get good. But after realizing that such panel was focusing on silly personal tidbits like whether celebrity 1 codes in her pajamas, and celebrity 2 cannot work without music, I ran out of patience and went next door to my second choice for that hour slot. It turned out to be wonderfully inspirational, though I missed Jim Coudal’s piece, and was only able to hear Brendan Dawes talk. Dawes shared with us a number of experiments he’s done within the span of 30-60 minutes. None of these things have any purpose at all. They just come out of crazy ideas that hit him. He just thinks “Let’s see what will happen”, and the product is just cool to watch. Getting something done, and getting it out there is the key. The podcast for this one is now available.
Gem #3. The 4-Hour Workweek
Yes. It’s possible. Tim Ferriss, a 29-year-old entrepreneur, has done it. He’s not a millionaire, but currently enjoys the life and adventures most of us postpone for retirement while his income source runs on auto-pilot. This presentation was full of great ideas. Ideas that we all have thought of, and maybe toyed with, but haven’t systematically implemented to change our lives. Hey, I changed careers and became a lot more mobile and free than I was before, but that’s not enough. Ferriss is about to publish a book sharing all this content. I can’t wait for my free copy.
Some of the most interesting things I heard him say, and note: these aren’t rocket science. He just acted on them:
- Analyze the 80/20 (Pareto’s rule) in your current life and work. Focus on the crucial few. Eliminate the rest — ruthlessly.
- Check email only twice a day. Eliminate all superfluous daily distractions. When distractions interrupt you, 40% of the time we don’t return to the task at hand (I’d say 80%, for me).
- Quantify the value of your time. Outsource anything that can be done cheaper.
- 24-hour access (via email, IM, cell phone, etc) doesn’t improve your life. Having people wait for you is a sign of power.
- You only want low-maintenance customers.
- You shouldn’t have a meeting to define the problem. Only to solve it. Conference calls without preparation are a waste of precious time.
- Browsing the Internet is overrated.
- Am I being productive or busy?
Definitely, listen to this presentation’s podcast.
Who Knew?
Things I heard of for the first time:
- Have you heard of fictional blogging?
- I hadn’t heard of lulu.com. People interested in free printing and delivery of their own publication or book, should definitely check them out.
- All stats about the state of the blogosphere and its imminent death are bull shit, says Jay Allen. Between undiscovered blogs, private personal blogs (which he wishes replaced email with friends and family), foreign language blogs, and intranet blogs, the blogosphere is actually growing but we’ll only be able to see the tip of the iceberg.
- Video mashup applications are everywhere. The question of copyright comes to my mind.
Things that were said…
… And worth highlighting:
“Dance like nobody’s watching”.
Greg Storey on how to write better.
“Design is not a thing you do. It’s a way of life”
Used by Jason Santa Maria and Rob Weychert during their talk about design inspiration (podcast already available)
