Author Archives: Jeremy Toeman

Following my theme of recognizing interesting barriers of communications due to technology (well, by theme I mean one post), I thought I’d help rant about another one.  And, just like the previous topic, it’s something I’ve probably been guilty of myself, and am also working on being better about.  Email has created an amazing barrier to communications.

What do I mean?

First, there’s the signal vs noise problem of people getting too many emails.  Newsletters and other mailing lists are partly to blame, as is spam, but a real issue in my opinion is the over-CC-ing.  Whether its large internal groups or other methods of including a lot of folks, there’s a whole heckuvalot of threads people are CC’ed on that are probably unnecessary.  Regardless of the Why, I don’t know anyone who doesn’t feel they get too much email to properly handle.

Second, people are using email to do things that are better done on the phone.  For example, scheduling phone calls.  It seems like instead of just picking up the phone and dialing people have resorted to emailing each other about the future plans to call each other.  Again, I’ll be totally upfront and admit I do it too, but I’m most certainly aware of the problem and am working on it.

Third, and the real reason I wrote this post, is related to #2 above, and is all about people using email to avoid having meetings.  Here’s a summary of how those emails go, where I’ll use fictitious Bill and Steve as my two personas having a realistic, but purely fictitious dialogue:

From: Bill
Sent: Monday, July 6th at 08:11am
To: Steve
Subject: Nice seeing you at that event!
Steve,
It was fun catching up with you in the halls at that conference.  I wanted to follow up with you on meeting in person to talk about possible opportunities.  How’s next Thursday at your office?
-Bill

From: Steve
Sent: Thursday, July 9th at 04:45pm
To: Bill
Subject: re: Nice seeing you at that event!
Good to see you too.  Can’t do next Thursday, going to be in NYC.  Would love to catch up.
S

From: Bill
Sent: Thursday, July 9th at 06:11pm
To: Steve
Subject: re: Nice seeing you at that event!
No problem.  How about the week following, when you’re back from your trip?  I’m good pretty much every afternoon other than Monday.  Let me know if anything in there works for you!
-Bill

From: Bill
Sent: Tuesday, July 14th at 11:41am
To: Steve
Subject: re: Nice seeing you at that event!
Steve,
Just wanted to touch base again about next week?  I’m still free on Mon, Tues, and Fri afternoons next week.  Anything good for you?
-Bill

From: Steve
Sent: Tuesday, July 14th at 11:42am
To: Bill
Subject: Out of Office Reply re: Nice seeing you at that event!

From: Bill
Sent: Monday, July 20th at 09:01am
To: Steve
Subject: Trying again…
Steve,
Hi, I’m still interested in meeting up with you this week.  I can do tomorrow after 3pm, or Friday after 1pm.  Anything there work?
-Bill

From: Steve
Sent: Monday, July 20th at 07:41pm
To: Bill
Subject: re: Trying again…
Sorry about missing you this week.  I could do something late next week if you can come out to my office.

From: Bill
Sent: Tuesday, July 21st at 08:44am
To: Steve
Subject: re: Trying again…
Sounds great.  Next Thursday, 2pm?  I’m free that afternoon.

From: Bill
Sent: Friday, July 24th at 10:11am
To: Steve
Subject: re: Trying again…
Steve – are we on for next Thursday afternoon?  I put down 2pm if that works for you…

From: Steve
Sent: Sunday, July 26th at 9:44pm
To: Bill
Subject: re: Trying again…
Going to end up on the road for big meetings this week, I didn’t realize you meant this week.

and so on…

Now I am definitely paraphrasing, but it’s not too far off the mark.  In our above scenario (in case it wasn’t clear) Steve just doesn’t want to meet with Bill, and just doesn’t seem to want to say it.  Instead, emails are ignored, meetings are missed, etc. There are certainly lots of excuses and such, but at the end of the day, it’s either time to pick up the phone, or drop it.  He’s just not that into meeting with you.

I’m sure my list of ways email is a pain is far from exhaustive.  But moving to Facebook, Twitter, or other direct messaging platforms is just substituting one leaky ship for another.  My only recommendation for fixing it is to keep your inbox as empty as possible, and to have the good sense about picking the right communication vehicle for the task at hand.  And there’s nothing like picking up the phone and just dialing…

The other day I wrote about my issues with tablet computers.  My general position, in a word, was that they suck.  Now observant readers like Andrew Parker noticed my last line: “if you do figure it out, I’m buying!” My post was about the real-world limitations of tablets, and was written specifically in contrast to the hype and attention the potential of tablets (and I’m definitely not the only one who feels the category has a terrible history and numerous challenges in reaching a wider customer base).  But what sucks more than the tablets was the kind of responses I saw both on my comments here and by a blogger at GottaBeMobile.  It really got me thinking about how easy it is to be a real jerk when there is no potential for face-to-face interaction.

Being a keyboard jerk, in a nutshell, is writing things you’d never have the cajones to say to someone in person for fear of some kind of retribution.  So I write a tongue-in-cheek post about tablets, and as a result, here are some of the “counter-arguments” (from commentors and the blog post in question):

• “Yes, sadly, I think Toeman has revealed himself as yet another critic who sits at a keyboard typing in English all day, someone who would gain no benefit from a tablet, and lacks the imagination to see beyond his condition.”
• “Did you know that the average IQ of tablet users is 1.482 times higher than those who think that tablets suck.”
• “It can certainly reveal how much a pundit’s opinion can suck though.”
• “Tablets make you tired. No, you tire easily because you’re a wuss.”

As commentor “Bob” on the blog pointed out “You have good points to make; there’s no reason to hide them under the blanket of a personal attack.” Wired’s Brian Chen wrote an excellent counter-point, and at no point did he stoop to do so.

There is no debate in my mind that neither Mark (the poster) nor any commentor would have said any of the above statements had we been chatting in person.  They are easy to type, but much, much harder to say.  In person, people have to see each others’ reactions, and in general, don’t like hurting feelings or saying things that might get them, say, punched.  So I could very comfortably talk derisively about a tablet computer because, well, who cares?

Look, it’s easy to type nastily.  Mark lives on the East Coast, he has no fear of me in any way, and I’m not much the punching type anyway.  And commentors tend to do so anonymously, which in my eyes is on a par with yelling at a pedestrian from inside a rapidly moving vehicle, which is why their value/contribution is roughly nil.

The reality is we all do it at some time.  We type without thinking.  We send “nastygram” emails to coworkers, colleagues, or even loved ones.  The keyboard is just so easy to use, and there’s no reason not to move rapidly.  I tweeted about how I “hated” a company’s user interface, which is true, and in fact something I’d be comfortable saying to that company’s CEO (which I ended up doing).  But it was inappropriate, and something better said in person or in a private email, and not for public consumption (which I apologized for).

So I pledge to be less of a keyboard jerk myself, and I hope others read, consider, and follow.  I can’t promise to be perfect, but hopefuly it’ll make my IQ increase, be less of a wuss, have a better imagination, and generally suck less.

I am in the process of signing up for Google Voice (my number ends with CALLJT, now how cool is that??) and had this minor freak-out moment realizing how much I depend on Google.  So I got to thinking about all the places where I really do rely on tech for my day-to-day living. I was wondering on my risk/exposure in the event that the given tech or service provider were to instantly stop working in a very permanent way.

Here’s my “audit”:

Thanks to this site’s HTML table generator!

I’m pretty sure that’s the sum of the list of high tech products and services I feel fairly dependent on.  Sure I could include stuff like a microwave or my car stereo, but I feel these are too commonplace to really be considered “high” tech.  I also didn’t include anything that was only about a specific company (for example if Verizon or Comcast ceased to exist, since their competition offers near-identical replacement services.  ditto for things like GCal, my email client or even office software, as they are so interchangeable).

Potential soon-to-be-added services:

• Jajah (we are considering dropping our US+Canada cell phone package and using Jajah for our calls to the Great White North)
• Google Voice (might use my new number as my primary number from now on, with forwarding rules to cell/office as needed)
• GPS (after my last Nuvi was stolen we went ~6 months before picking up a new one)

Anything you feel dependent on that you’d like to share with the group?

I blogged about “twittergate” yesterday, and it seems like the topic of “was this ethical” continues to rear its head across blogs and publications. LewisPR put up a poll asking “Was TechCrunch right to publish Twitter’s business plans?” – the overwhelming majority as I write this says “no”.  So this post is dedicated to all the “yes”es out there.  I’ll outline parallel “ethical dilemmas” and we’ll see how easy this really is to boil down.

Scenario 1:
You walk into a pawn shop (for whatever reason).  While in the shop you see a car stereo selling for $10.  It’s brand new (clearly) and you pull out your iPhone, google the product number, and learn it retails for $399.  But here it is, in front of you, without a box or instructions, for only $10.  You inquire to the store manager as to its origin, he merely responds that someone sold it to him (along with a briefcase and laptop).  As you inspect the unit for damage, you see some scratches around the edges and some of the wires on the back are broken, implying it was previously mounted into a car dashboard and hastily removed. In hushed tones, the pawn broker says it was almost definitely stolen. Do you buy it?

If you said “yes”, congratulations, you are contributing to the country’s crime problem.  Well done. Scumbag.

A quick analysis of the above scenario should reveal the overall answer to why you shouldn’t buy or otherwise endorse stolen things.  Even emails.

Scenario 2:
The person closest to you in the whole world (old friend, spouse, parent, sibling – you pick) accidentally CC’s you on an internal company email with lots of important sensitive documents.  You run a top media outlet and frequently make/break news.  The documents contain many company secrets. Your friend/spouse/etc informs you that publishing the documents would cost them their job, and possibly hurt their business in a massive way (and probably end your relationship).  Do you publish them (and knowingly cause a person you love to become unemployed based on your direct actions)?

If you said “yes”, my hunch is you’ve formed no close relationships in your life and probably need some help.  Seriously, you’d do something that would cause your kid brother to lose his job? Wha???

A quick analysis of the above scenario should reveal that when your actions can hurt those you love, you think quite carefully about them.  And if that’s true, shouldn’t we have the same respect for those who aren’t necessarily as close to us?

So back to “twittergate”.  We’ve asserted that endorsing theft is wrong.  We’ve asserted that there are times when we shouldn’t reveal secrets, regardless of the means by which we learned them.  So by the transitive property…

Despite the ridiculousness of the headset laws in California, I have bigger fights to fight, and condone to use a headset while driving.  Until a week ago my headset of choice was the SoundID 100.  I love how easily it slips into my ear and the sound quality is great.  My three complaints were unimpressive battery life, a not-so-great pairing with my phone (which I don’t blame on SoundID, but it simply didn’t sound good with my Samsung phone), and a tendency to occasionally make screeching noises directly into my eardrum.  The latter probably being the biggest detriment to the headset.

Now loathe I am to replace a working product, when I had the opportunity to try out the newest Jawbone Primes, I was intrigued.  After all, while I’ve never had a great experience in the past (I think it was a facial hair thing), everyone else seems to love them.  I decided to try the bright yellow model (in the office it’s affectionately referred to as a banana on my head).  The pink and red ones were a little too… pink and red.  The black, silver, and brown ones were all too drab.  Leavining banana yellow as just right!  Plus it adds that touch of panache that I could only otherwise pull off by accumulating a collection of very interesting hats. Here’s a quick vid of it:

Sporting a Yello Jawbone prime. on 12seconds.tv

The Jawbone Prime is the third generation of headsets from Aliph, and this time I think they’ve got a real winner.  Others have looked good, and they’ve generally been accepted as the premium headset (I’d once have said the Cadillac of Headsets, but really, in today’s world does anyone actually want the Cadillac of Anything???), but I’ve felt they’ve lacked on performance.  Not anymore.  The unit pairs extremely well with my phone (your mileage may vary), and the sound quality is excellent.  These are obviously the top factors in considering any headset, but I’ll continue with more.

My favorite physical improvement to the Jawbone is the in-ear loops, which function quite similarly to the SoundID unit.  No more trying to wrap weird things around my ears (which I never do well and makes me feel even more uncoordinated than I am).  I haven’t yet given it the “can I leave it in my ear all day” test, but it’s definitely not uncomfortable. My only issue is I feel I’m somewhere between the medium and large earbuds.

I have no real comment yet on the battery life.  The specs claim 4.5 hrs talk time, 8 days standby, I haven’t yet had the battery die, so I would guess it’s probably slightly lower (since I’ve *never* seen an accurate battery life assessment from a company) – regardless, I keep the USB charging cable in my laptop bag now.  The packaging for the unit is truly beautiful, possibly the best-designed I’ve ever seen.  And now for the zinger – but I wish they weren’t using so much plastic and other unsustainable materials to accomplish such beauty.

Finally, my only real product complaints – the buttons.  While putting the unit in my ear, I tend to push the button that disconnects a call (while the phone is ringing).  Further, there are so many button combinations (push one of them 5 times in a row to activate a feature) that as a result I can’t remember any of them.  Now there’s an obvious, necessitated tradeoff between incorporating so much functionality and only having two buttons, but I have to think there is a better way to handle it.  That said, since I am definitely adopting the Jawbone Prime as my default headset, this is more in the “annoyance” category than anything else.

So there you have it. Definite thumbs-up for the Jawbone Prime.  Get your own not-so-mellow Yello here at Amazon for $129.