What do you think?
I’ve done some tests on seeneverywhereelse.200u.com/wordpress to see if I can translate this wordpress.com blog into a stand alone version.

Give me feedback!

Here’s a thought: if animals evolve into the thing they need to be, where will mankind be in a few thousand years.

The reason giraffes have developed such a long neck is because the food that they eat is on trees. They need their neck to reach their food. A chameleon has developed it’s camouflage techniques because it needs to be invisible for predators. You can look up thousands of these evolutionary facts. The main basis for this is that the animal (or plant) adapts itself to it’s surroundings to be able to survive.

The last couple of thousands of years, mankind has changed this. Since evolution is not going as fast as we like, we adapt our surroundings to our own desires. So this raised a few questions with me: will mankind not evolve any more because there are no more necessary inherent traits needed to survive? Or even worse, will mankind evolve into creatures that do not improve their abilities but adapt the surroundings we have created for ourselves? Where will we evolve from their?

If we keep changing our environment to make it easier for people to do what needs to be done, I fear that there will only be a downward spiral until people are just brains in blobs.

What do you think?

Wikipedia says “Single Serving Sites is the Internet Phenomenon of creating websites with a dedicated domain name, with only one page, that do one thing only.”

This is a trend that I noticed some time ago. The originators think of a url and fill in the one page website with the most basic of content.

The biggest question that I ask myself is if these are at all interesting and more importantly purposeful.
What you mostly see are sites that are just a funny gadget or sites that give content that you can easily get somewhere else or even know instantly.

For those of you who do appreciate these types of minimalistic, redundant and just plain stupid sites: here is a list of examples:

http://isitchristmas.com/
http://amiawesome.com/
http://whatcoloristheempirestatebuilding.com/
http://www.howmanypeopleareinspacerightnow.com/
http://khaaan.com/
http://istwitterdown.com/
http://www.purple.com/
http://yousneezed.com/
http://letsturnthisfuckingwebsiteyellow.com/
http://whatismyip.org/
http://www.isapplestoredown.com/
http://www.internetfirstpage.com/
http://areyoureallysad.com/
http://doesthemailruntoday.com/
http://isobamapresident.com/
http://www.isthedowup.com/

http://isbarackobamamuslim.com/

http://isitcanadadayyet.com/

Maybe this question is too far fetched, but here it goes anyway:
Are we going to a culture where you can just type in your question as an url and the web gives you the answer?
I certainly hope not.

What do you think?

This presentation gives some nice insights in the future of the web.

Some are good, some are bad but everything is interesting.

In the past week, I have busied myself by adding an “add to any” button on most of my posts. Here and there I have added a page on stumbleupon. The results are spectacular. So I decided to write something about the effect of stumbleupon to your site. Here it goes:

Personal effects

As you see on these stats, the objective result is staggering. The visits to this very blog were multiplied tenfold in just a day. I can see very clearly in the rest of the statistics, that the most views were generated towards the articles that I actually registered on Stumbleupon. This is no shock at all. What did surprise me is that people tend to linger and check out the other pages as well.

Is this as good for you as it is for me?

Stumbling can, as you see, bring a lot of people to your site in a short amount of time. But is this the best course of action? Isn’t it better to create a reputation for yourself and get targeted hits from people who actually want to read what you write? Stumblers are people who don’t know what they are looking for and trust the social bookmarking site to make the choice for them. I want to compare them to channelsurfers on regular tv, just flicking through the channels to see what’s on instead of taking the tv guide and doing the research.
Well, you can go like this but in all honesty: f*** that. You and I both know that it’s very cool to see so many people visiting your site.

Take a chance

Chances are you, yes you, have reached this page through stumble. The fact that you are still reading this, confirms my suspicion that some people tend to linger and view more pages of the blog. Who am I to argue. There are some nice posts on here as I say so myself.
I hope some of you return here and there to check up on me.

If you like me to check up on you: comment.
If you like to know more: comment:
If you like me to check you out: comment
If you like me so much for other people to check me out: share this page.

Thanks for reading!

No, it’s not a typo. I’ve just started a new project. And it’s a project project.

You can see it on 99 projects. It’s been a long time that I have to many ideas in my head. With this new site, I can write them down (when I have the time) and share them with the world. My goal is to finish writing down the 99 projects and then I’ll treat myself to something. I don’t know exactly what but it will be something good. So go and take a look and as always: comment, comment, comment.

Managing a lot of projects at the same time takes practice. At the moment I am doing eight (8) simultaneously. It used to be very hard. I sent mails to the wrong people, made adaptations in the wrong files, tested on the wrong platforms, … you name it. But when time goes by, people tend to get a little smarter. (I hope I do anyway) You learn new things by doing, master new skills, manage your time better. That’s the key to managing multiple projects: manage your time.

To help you conquer the mountain of work you might have before you: here are a few tips to make sure the mountain doens’t fall on Mohammed.

1. Take notes

In the initial concept phase of a project, ideas tend to fly around freely and discussion tend to get out of control. To make sure everyone remembers the same thing, make sure to take notes. If you have the time, at the end of the meeting summarize them verbally so everyone knows what is said and what they need to do.

2. Make detailed briefings

After this first meeting, write everything down in a structural way and send it to everyone that has even the slightest of affinity with the project. Everyone needs to know where you’re at. They can always delete the file if they don’t want to read it. And of course it is a great way to cover yourself in case someone says “I didn’t know that.” The answer to this question is easy: “Yes you did. It was in the briefing.” Trust me, after someone asks this question a few times, they will definitely read briefings more carefully.
In this briefing, be sure to include: short project description, contact details of everyone involved, deadlines, open issues, next meeting date (if already set) and a list of next steps.

3. Make structured to do lists

Per project, make a list of what needs to be done. Include deadlines, assignees, reviewers and of course the task. This way, people can just open the document, see what needs to be done by when and do it. In a perfect world this would be done automatically. Alas, the world is not perfect by far, so again, this can be used as a way to say “I told you so.”.

4. Keep versions

When you are making a product and keep revising it. It is best to keep the different versions instead of only saving the last updated file. Not only you can track progress like this, you can always refer to it later if you need to.

5. Categorize!

Whether it is in your file browser, image browser, mail program, or just on your desk: make sure to seperate all projects from each other. For example: In my inbox in Outlook, there is only one (1) mail. Every mail that comes in to my outlook is immediately categorized. I have folders for every project and it’s the best decision I have ever made. If the mail contains a todo, I flag it and get back to it later. If you work this way, every project will remain separate and you will always find the mails you’re looking for much more easily.

6. 1 project / 1 mail

Do not send mails concerning more than one project. This is a sure way to mix everything up.

Bonus tip:

Shut down your mail regularly.
If you’re really swamped, just turn off your mail program. If there are urgent matters people will know where to find you, you can count on it.
In the meantime, you are free to work on any project you choose.

Always keep your cool. Do not get upset. Tomorrow is another day because the world will not end if you don’t answer a mail.

Do you have more handy tips? Comment below and we’ll see if it gets added.

Hi everyone

Since about a week, I have received more views than ever before. It’s not spectacular when you place it next to big blog numbers but when you compare it to the last few months, it really is remarkable. The thing is, that I don’t know where they come from.  I can see in my dashboard which posts are most viewed.

E.g. Trend: converting everyday products into design items was pretty popular. Maybe I just struck a nerve there. Do you think I should do more posts in the same way? Maybe I should, but does that mean I cave to public demand when there is none?

This is a great article about where marketing has been and where it is going.

Very insightfull:

http://www.baekdal.com/articles/management/market-of-information/

Well, It might not be the greatest but it’s still a good idea I have.

The problem is that I don’t want to post it online. I have been thinking about what to do and I have some concerns.

It’s a product Idea in a field I don’t know, which means that I have no clue who to approach about this.
I know it’s great, but I have no means of making a working model for now.
I don’t want to post it online because it’s easy to manufacture and could be the greatest thing since those little table they put in pizza boxes to keep the pizza from sticking to the top of the box. Any company with a little know how can duplicate it easily so I don’t want to give it away for free.
I’m looking at some product innovation competitions but they are all very technical and my idea is just to simple.
That’s why I’m in a pickle.

If anyone has a suggestion on how to go forward on this, let me know.