Dogear Nation

Andy Piper, Michael Row, and Michael Martine have been reviewing cutting edge websites on their Dogear Nation blog and Dogear Nation podcast since April 2007.  They're all software developers at IBM on their day jobs and have produced 114 episodes.

They and their friends search the web for the coolest web 2.0, social networking, gadgets, and virtual reality action and tag those sites on Del.icio.us with the “dogear-nation”. Each week they pick the sites they find the most interesting and review them on their podcast.  Many episodes also include a guest interview with an interesting person working at one of the cool sites, a small software company, or something similar.

If you like to keep up with the latest iPhone applications, security and privacy issues, cool tools for creating web site animation, commerce in virtual worlds, augmented reality, etc. this is a site for you!

The Art of Teaching Entrepreneurship and Innovation

The podcast "The Art of Teaching Entrepreneurship and Innovation" from the Stanford University Technology Ventures Program was a really excellent podcast.  It made me wish I was a student again and working on an MBA at Stanford.  Tina Seelig, author of the entrepreneurship book What I Wish I Knew When I Was 20: A Crash Course on Making Your Place in the World, presents some really amazing ideas that students have come up with when challenged to make money from next to nothing.

Examples include one class that was divided into groups and each group was given $5 and two hours to raise as much money as possible and then make a 3 minute presentation to the class.  The exercise was designed to help the students learn to challenge assumptions.  The team that made the most money was the team that realized that the most valuable thing they had was not the $5 or the two hours but the 3 minutes of class time.  They sold their 3 minute presentation time  to a company interested in recruiting Stanford MBA students.

This really is worth checking out if you like to think of yourself as a creative, out-of-the-box thinker. Check out the podcast on iTunes.

Here's Tina's book.

Emmanuel Jal - Music of a War Child

The following podcast/videocast will challenge your view of the world and how easy it is to ignore the plight of children in war zones in far away places.

“For five years, young Emmanuel Jal fought as a child soldier in the Sudan. Rescued by an aid worker, he's become an international hip-hop star and an activist for kids in war zones. In words and lyrics, he tells the story of his amazing life.”

His story will also put you in awe of people like Emma McCune , an aid worker who volunteered to go to the Sudan and is credited with personally saving more than 150 children there during the war.

Check out Emmanual Jal's story, his poetry, and his music at Emmanual Jal on TEDTalks (see also on iTunes). 

Email Bankruptcy and Other Symptoms of Information Overload

Anyone who has given up on reading all the emails that arrive while on vacation, given up on reading all the blogs that other people recommend, and given up on keeping up with every new technology that comes out appreciates the concept of “information overload”.   Coping with the overload is the subject of the podcast “Managing Information Overload”, a Harvard Businss Ideacast interview with Paul Hemp.  Paul is the author of the Harvard Business Review article "Death by Information Overload”.   

It was during this interview that I learned of some of the techniques companies are experiementing with to control email overload such as disabling the "Reply to All" button and prioritizing the contents of email inbaskets according to a user rating point system which prevents users from arbitrarily declaring all their emails as "urgent".  I also heard the phrase "email bankruptcy" for the first time to describe people who simply give up on catching up on email and simply delete all email and start over.

Check out the podcast interview. Its episode 159 at Harvard Business IdeaCast or also on iTunes.

Crossing the Chasm

If you business has anything to do with high technology, you have probably heard the expression "crossing the chasm" which is used to describe the problem of moving a new technology from the early adopters to broader adoption.  That phrase was coined by Geoffrey Moore in his classic business book Crossing the Chasm which first came out in 1991.  Phil McKinney, the CTO of Hewlett Packard's Personal Systems Group, interviewed Geoffrey Moore on his Killer Innovations podcast.  There is some good conversation about how the situation has changed and what it takes to cross the chasm now. The interview is in two parts.  Check out part one and part two.  See also part one on iTunes and part two on iTunes.  The full show notes and partial transcript is posted over at thenextbench.com.

Solving the World's Clean Water Problem for $20 Billion

This video really opened my eyes to the problem of finding clean water in the developing world and after natural disasters which contaminate the fresh water supply.


Check out Michael Pritchard's water filter turns filthy water drinkable on TEDTalks.  (See also on iTunes).  He gives a great demonstration how his invention cleans disgusting water from contaminants by drinking the purified water himself and offering it to someone else.  Very convincing.  He claims all the poor of the world could have clean water for a meer $20 billion.

Why a 50-Year Old Man Needs an iPod (or other MP3 player)

I don't profess to be the smartest guy in the world but I must admit that I like learning something new.  I like  brainstorming and discussing ideas with smart, creative people.  Even if I disagree with them, just talking about why they choose one idea or approach over another helps me be sure I'm not blind to some fact I have not considered or just too proud to back down.  Debate makes me feel like I know why I believe something to be true. 

Also, I crave new information.  I work in a career in which technology changes rapidly.  One competitor may leapfrog another.  One approach may become obsolete.  One company may change a business model or their pricing structure and make new alternatives viable.  When I flip thru the cable TV channels I often find myself choosing to watch The History Channel, The Discovery Channel, or some documentary on one of the news networks on the economy.  To me, learning is more fun most of the time than watching a sitcom or reality show. I also want information that helps me improve my life, help my family, lift my spirit, save my money, grow my investments, and protect me from scams.

Listening to podcasts on my iPod nano helps me fit these passions into the otherwise wasted time I spend commuting to work or squeezed into an airline seat.  I even listen to my iPod when I doing those necessary but mind numbing tasks like washing the car or mowing the lawn.  (I put wear my ear buds under ear muff style ear protection.  I'd love to find ear protection with a bluetooth connection to my iPod.)

If my description has a few things in common with you, I hope you'll check out my blog occassionally for recommendations for your own Apple iPod, Apple iPhone, Microsoft Zune, Creative Zen, SanDisk Sansa, or other MP3 player that could brighten your day.  Even better, leave a comment to suggest one of your own favorites.

Are Our Decisions Really Our Own?

I discovered TEDTalks and have really enjoyed it.  TED stands for a non-profit called "Technology, Entertainment, and Design" that puts on conferences devoted to putting speakers in front of audiences with "ideas worth spreading."

One of my favorite talks is one in which Dan Ariely asks, Are we in control of our own decisions? (see also iTunes)  Dan is a behavioral economist and the author of Predictably Irrational.  He uses classic visual illusions and his own counterintuitive (and sometimes shocking) research findings to show how we're not as rational as we think when we make decisions.  One of my favorite examples is comparing the percentage of drivers in Germany who agree to donate their organs in the event of their death to the percentage of drivers who do the same in Austria.  These two countries share the same language and have similar cultures.  Why does one country have a much higher percentage of organ donation than the other?  The answer, it is the paper form.  In one country the form says if you check nothing, they assume you do not want to participate and in the other country the form says if you check nothing, they assume you DO want to participate.  What does this have to say about how rational we are when we make decisions.  Its thought-provoking listening and challenges you about how you really make your decisions. 

Here's Dan's book if your interested.