[Editors Note: This post is from 2011] Starting on Saturday, September 10th, I will be embarking on an epic journey: Bicycling from Vancouver, BC to San Francisco CA. I’ll be carrying everything I need with me on the bicycle, like camping gear, food, and clothes. I’ve written before about the wonderful clarity you can get from taking a vacation from technology, but this trip will be different. One month away is a little too long, and […]

Imagine you have a store, and you want to get more people to walk in off the street. You put a sign outside that’s red with tall lettering that says (rather loudly) 30% OFF SALE TODAY! And you wait. And wait.. And wait… .. Maybe people see it, maybe they don’t. Maybe people walk in, maybe they don’t. Why aren’t customers being attracted by the 30% off sale? Maybe the sale needs to be 40%? Maybe the […]

My guest post on Kind Over Matter got me thinking about other forms of kindness on the internet. And what I realized, is that the internet is one big ball of kindness, if you play your cards right. Now, before you change the channel– We turn to the internet with all of our questions and we rely on the kindness of strangers for our answers. Sometimes we search Google and get a website with the answer […]

It happens to the best of us. We are cruising along on our computers, working on our next great project or idea, when all of a sudden we hit a wall. Then, one little challenge becomes seemingly impossible to move beyond. We are so close to solving it, but it just won’t work. We try and try and spend hours figuring it out, but cannot triumph over it. We waste our time and energy for the […]

I’ve spent a lot of time helping people figure stuff out. And you wouldn’t believe some of the things that I’ve heard. “I want you to watch the way I’m doing this so you can see how stupid I am” and my favorite “This is so easy for you, I’m just never going to get it” Throughout my experience, I’ve found that there is one critical difference between the people who improve and people who stay the same. […]

Undo Send We’ve all been there: you spend half an hour writing a strongly worded letter, hit send, and realize you probably shouldn’t have done that. Thankfully, Gmail Labs’ Undo Send feature is there to save you from yourself. After sending an email, Gmail will wait a predefined number of seconds (5, 10, 20, or 30, configurable in Gmail’s settings) before sending—at any point during which you can hit the “undo” button to take back […]

Look, credit cards are great. There’s a paper trail, there’s fraud protection, there’s incredible convenience — just swipe and go. But why is it that only companies accept them? Why can’t we use them to pay the piano teacher, the baby sitter, the lawn-mowing teenager, even first graders at their lemonade stand? Why aren’t credit cards accepted at garage sales, food carts and PTA bake sales? Heck, when your tipsy buddy wants to borrow $20 […]

A shortage of digital coaches Here are three things that are true:1. Digital technology, especially computers and cell phones, can dramatically increase productivity.2. More and more users of digital technology are small firms or individuals.3. The vast majority of users of digital technology are totally lame in getting the most out of the investment of their time and money. via sethgodin.typepad.com Why am I a digital coach? When I read Seth’s article, I practically jumped out […]