The Brave New World of Multitasking

How well do you delegate priorities to your 100 billion neurons? Here's a great article from the weekend in the New York Times on multitasking. One interesting thing is the challenge to our perception that the millennials and younger people are growing up accustomed to their attentions being split between all the competing, usually technology-oriented tasks. This Vanderbilt University study suggests that interruptions are the equalizer, that is, answering the cell phone tends to bring the younger group's slight edge in speed and accuracy down to the level of the rest of us.

As Neil Postman points out in his classic Technopoly, "...the changes wrought by technology are subtle if not downright mysterious, one might say even wildly unpredictable."

Who Is Steven Furtick?

Albert Einstein said the thing he wondered most was, "Is the universe friendly?"

Lately people are wondering why Britney shaved her head, why Brad Delp committed suicide with a note on his shirt about being a "lonely soul," who Anna Nicole Smith's child's father is, and why so many successful people are in rehab.

According to today's blog engine list on Technorati, people are wondering, "Who is Steven Furtick and why is he beating out typical #1 topics like Twitter at the top of the Technorati list? You may be surprised to learn he's the pastor of a church called Elevation in North Carolina who reads Seth Godin's marketing blog among others. Steven's gotten "addicted" to Technorati in the last couple weeks and now that he's at the top, you guessed it, he's in rehab (from Technorati that is).

And then some people, like Paris Hilton (#7 on the list), aren't wondering anything.

Congratulations and best wishes for a happy Easter Steven!

Orwellian Politics - Hillary in 1984

If you look back at my post of February 14, you'll see I anticipated a youtube video featuring Hillary Clinton. And just a little over a month later, courtesy of "parkridge47" here it is. OK, it's not exactly what I thought it would be, but the influence of video on the hyperindividualized culture is the next big thing in marketing (and political campaigns). There are already over 240,000 hits (update-make that 1 million) to the site. Careful, once you see this mash-up of the classic Apple 1984 commercial you may not be able to scrape it off your consciousness. You think I'm kidding...

Googling The Future

The headlines around firefighting over rights to copyrighted material in an online society are shifting from iTunes to YouTube with Viacom's billion-dollar suit with Google. Here's a recent video interview about the "master plan" for Google's future with Google's VP of Search Product and User Experience Marissa Mayer (German site, but the interview is in English).

Another Google Release

Google Desktop 5 debuts today... another step in the asymptotic pursuit of perfection.

ITIL In the USA

What a great presentation by Malcolm Fry yesterday at the Westin in Chicago -- put together the affable nature of Gromit's companion Wallace with the spontaneous contemplative vision of Yoda, and throw in a bit of John Cleese for good measure and there's Malcolm Fry.

He claims Jimmy Buffett "stole his life" (see photo), but he seems to have a pretty good life traveling around the world talking about configuration management databases and the best-practice guide called ITIL. Not a bad gig for a poor British kid who hails from a family of longshoremen and Romany gypsies.

Talking with Malcolm earlier this week, I was struck by how well-traveled and well-read he is and his ability to put his own not-entirely-occidental perspective on things. Outside the speaking tour he's on perpetually, his latest (anniversary) trip with his wife was to the jungle temples of Angkor Wot at Siem Reap in Cambodia, but you name anyplace in the world and he's likely to be able -- and glad to -- talk with you about it.

Malcolm is also quick to expand your list of reading requirements -- his latest recommendations being "The Devil in the White City" and "Civilization One" (about the "megalithic yard,") and anything by James Michener. He's also got his own book out recently which is a part of the current tour - Step-by-Step to Building a CMDB, (say-em-day-bay in Britspeak) which follows up a series of booklets he wrote on ITIL and a DVD series with the Help Desk Institute.

If you're in southern Wisconsin or Central California, Malcolm will be in the states for another briefing at the Milwaukee itSMF this week and then at the Hilton in San Francisco for a briefing next Wednesday. Drop me an e-mail if you'd like details.

Parents as Managers

If you're breathing, you've thought about the trade-offs involved in working and raising a family and how we as a society prioritize these two. There's a story in the headlines every day with some connection to this issue, whether it's the tabloids or the Wall Street Journal. Here's an interesting article about parenting, management and the work-life balance from Hannah Clark at Forbes including ten reasons parents make better managers.