Performance Zen

Author: spierzchala

  • Yahoo Starts Blogging Service…In Japan

    Yahoo has started a new free blogging service for the Japanese market. [here]
    Unusual to see Japan as a test market, but you have to think that someone at Yahoo Corporate is playing with the new Yahoo Blog Tool that will be released in the US.
    Any comments from Yahoo! Blogging Team?

  • Someone’s Marketing Team Needs to be Synergized

    What does “Synergized” mean? It is a term you her a lot in the Merger game; it effectively means we are going to fire a whole bunch of you.

    I received an e-mail at 1:43PM EST, February 2, 2005 for an event. I will provide the time and place, but not the name.

    Wednesday, February 2, 2005
11:00 AM to 3:00 PM
Radisson Hotel Boston
200 Stuart St
Boston, MA 02116

    Yeah, that’s right. It as already started.

    Execution failure.

  • Not the only one moving to a new site

    Joi Ito.

  • Windows WinAmp Edition

    Dan Gillmor is asking the Internet Community to assist Microsoft Name its new version of XP, sans Media Player.
    My contribution is above.
    Joi Ito is looking for contributions as well. [here]
    Rob Enderle weighs in here.

  • Drop Testing a Toshiba Tablet

    Ouch!


    I have never dropped a laptop, but I have caught my eldest prying the keys off a Toshiba Tecra 8100. Ever had to put the keys back on a laptop? When you are ham-handed like I am…it was a two-hour curse-fest with the ZenWife laughing at me, scolding the boy and grimacing at my language — simultaneously.


    One of the shift keys was never quite the same.


    Then two years later, I found his younger brother doing the same thing to another Toshiba Tecra 8100.

    Ok, this story is better.

  • PC mini in a Mac mini case

    This is an abomination. But I am not sure which group, the Windows Regime or the Mac Mob, will consider it the greater heresy.

  • I can’t connect to rpc.technorati.com

    All of my posts for the last 12 hours or so have been hung up in the PING phase. Looks like the Technorati Ping Server (rpc.technorati.com) is down or unavailable. I can’t even open a TCP connection to it.

  • A Rant Against Lotus Notes

    I have never had the pleasure of working for an organization that uses Lotus Notes as its primary corporate e-mail program. And I never will work for one; this is one of the core beliefs that guide my life.

    • I will never work in a mill or plant
    • I will never work in a restaurant
    • I will never work in retail
    • I will never work for Google
    • I will never use Lotus Notes

    Lotus Notes is a long-lost relic of the early 1990s, when GUI design was in its infancy and the precepts were still being laid out. This site, categorizes 70 reasons for the loathing that this dinosaur evokes.
    Number #71: Lotus Notes still can’t receive HTML e-mail messages, 10 years on.
    Article link courtesy of Damien Katz.

  • Getting scanned from Comcast IP address — AGAIN

    This time, the IP (67.164.122.83) is definitely a client computer.
    It’s hitting me once every 15 minutes, like clockwork.
    Time to add another entry to the IPTABLES config. Done.

  • The Reality of Usability, Standards and Design

    In an interview with InfoDesign, Jared Spool talks about Web Design.

    The TakeAway:

    I learned quickly that business executives didn’t care about usability testing or information design. Explaining the importance of these areas didn’t get us any more work. Instead, when we’re in front of executives, we quickly learned to talk about only five things:


    1. How do we increase revenue?
    2. How do we reduce expenses?
    3. How do we bring in more customers?
    4. How do we get more business out of each existing customer?
    5. How do we increase shareholder value?

    Notice that the words ‘design’, ‘usability’, or ‘navigation’ never appear in these questions. We found, early on, that the less we talked about usability or design, the bigger our projects got. Today, I’m writing a proposal for a $470,000 project where the word ‘usability’ isn’t mentioned once in the proposal.