Reigniting the Passion

Over the past few weeks I’ve been searching for correlations between my professional life, which I’ve had my share of successes, and my personal life, which I’ve had my share of failures — all in efforts to find balance in my personal life (and possibly bring more gumption professionally).

What I’ve realized is that being extremely focused on a single job, project, or relationship narrows focus and can be disastrous long-term. There is an aspect of complacency that develops from only learning from one vantage point; this is a trap that I’ve been caught in. As CEO of Kayak said when describing how he hires:

I believe that the top creative people are at their peak when they see

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Technology and Unhappiness

Having a job based on information and consumption, “Happiness Takes (A Little) Magic” really hit home with me. I’ve taken steps in the past to distance myself from over-consumption and even wrote about my views on “Hyper-Connected, Ultra-Casual Waste of Time.” It’s actually quite funny that Brian compared technology to a hammer, because I wrote the exact same thing (or close, I suppose).

Informationally, we are becoming lard-asses. In the pageview and ratings driven media economy, too much of the content these days is designed to be just like junk food to quickly boost quantifiable viewership. If you make content that is the intellectual equivalent of gummy bears, your site will appear to grow quickly. Advertisers reward size, and growing

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Pujols’ Sell Out Price: $44 Million

There had been a lot of reported offers from a variety of teams but for the sake of keeping things simple, let’s assume the Cardinals final offer was $210 million (Angels: $254 – Cardinals: $210 = Sell Out Price: $44).

Pujols wearing a Los Angeles Angels’ uniform is not going to be a comfortable sight for any Cardinals’ fan. He’s provided so much to our small market over the past 11 years and, in return, we’ve provided our unwavering support. That being said, it’s very disappointing for both sides that negotiations this offseason had to be so cold. Maybe emotions are still running high, but I feel we were let down by Pujols. Not because he doesn’t deserve a chance to move …

Enough with the Gluten-Free and Vegan Talk

Stop wearing your diet restrictions like a badge on your sleeve. Seriously.

It is unfortunate that the way our food is processed and how our body’s react has caused food allergies and diseases (celiac). And I completely respect others’ personal choices to adopt a vegetarian or vegan eating regiment.

But we don’t need clarifications that every [catch phrase] food you consume is categorized as gluten-free or vegan. We don’t need to tell be told that you are eating “vegan gumbo” or “gluten-free cookies.” Really? Why can’t you just say cookies? If you just say cookies do you think we are going to be worried because we know you have celiac disease and you made an ignorant choice to consume gluten?…

Google+ = Users’ Opportunity to Define

I feel like I’ve read too many in-depth articles reviewing Google+. Reviewers are quick to point out pros and cons, compare against other services and speculate Google’s direction all because the platform is a trending topics.

Honestly, here is the best review I’ve read thus far (and ironically in 140 characters or less) from @LisaFrame:

Simple enough. Google has created plenty of robust products, which look to be linked together quite nicely with Google+. With the service only being a few weeks old, it is hard to speculate the future or decide whether or not it’ll be a Facebook/Twitter killer.

For now, I think users have the chance to define the platform by digging in to the features currently …

Revisiting: Hyper-Connected, Ultra-Casual Waste of Time

I stumbled upon some posts from my old blog runinthefront.com and was thoroughly tickled. Sometimes I really question what runs through my head; I mean, there were blog posts entitled “Baby: The Other White Meat” and “Energy, Schmenergy!” I’ll have to revisit those later, but for now I want to focus on the post below, which was posted January 2008.

This rant all came about via a post on the now defunct DoshDosh. I’ll admit, there are some parts below that confuse me a bit, but for the most part I still feel the same three years later. I still think there is an impersonal divide between the development of social media and users. More and more people join without …

On Creating Novel Experiences

The past six months have been a complete whirlwind.

I finally took a little time last night to stop and reflect upon the constant, chaotic changes (for the best) in my day-to-day. Looking back I realized everything is flying by so quickly, I haven’t had much time to properly digest my experiences. That led to two realizations:

First, being driven isn’t the same as being passionate. For the first time in my career I really enjoy what I am learning, the challenges I am facing and applying it all to the greater good of a cohesive team. I haven’t even thought about the destination I am looking to reach; instead, I am focusing on each step of maturation as …

Own Your Piece of the Internet, Already!

At what point do you think posting all our information, ideas and content in closed networks and platforms is going to catch up with us? The flexibility and organization of these simple sites (e.g., Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr) overshadows the fact that we are giving up ownership of everything with a quick click of “Submit.”

With the combination of cheap hosting and open-source CMS platforms I can’t think of a solid reason not to create your own personal little internet space. From there, share your content on social sites with a link back to your website. You’ll get credit, have control and never have to worry about how your information will be used — it’s the proverbial driver’s seat.

I don’t …

BREAKING NEWS: Reading in the US on the rise, sadly.

Sorry if my chicken scratch needs translation.

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Facebook Hiatus

I decided that I am going to take a break from Facebook for a while, so I took the proper steps to deactivate my account. You ask, “Why don’t you just, well, not visit the site anymore?” The sad truth is that visiting a lot of these social sites have become habitual — I find myself looking at the same times of day, checking whenever I get an email notice and especially when I could be focusing on much more productive things (ie., starting to blog on a regular basis again). Deactivation will just act as aid in break.

This doesn’t mean that I am giving up on social media all together. In fact, I still love Twitter (and a …