Genuine Curiosity

Author Dwayne Melancon is always on the lookout for new things to learn. An ecclectic collection of postings on personal productivity, travel, good books, gadgets, leadership & management, and many other things.

 

Time for another audit

Well, it's that time again - I'm going to do another "time audit" starting next week. As I've written in the past, I get a lot of value from periodically analyzing how I spend my time. Time audits help you better adjust your prioritization, balance, and productivity and I'm feeling like I'm due for one.

Tools for tracking

As usual, I have been looking for tools to make this easier and I've found one that I think is going to be really effective: it's from David Seah's "Printable CEO" toolset, and he calls it the "Emergent Time Tracker."

At David's site, you can find several formats of this form that you can download for free, along with instruction on how to use the tracker and interpret / analyze your results. There is even an annotated example to get you going quickly (thumbnail at right), and a beta version of an online time tracking tool.

Bren told me about another web-based tracking tool called "SlimTimer" that looks interesting.

Give it time

If you're going to do a time audit of your own, I recommend doing it for two weeks. Not only does this give you plenty of data to work with, I also find that my 2nd week is more complete because I'm more diligent about logging my activities as the habit starts to settle in.

Taking another cue from David Seah, I've also just ordered a Kitchenaid timer. I think it'll help me be more conscious of how I use my time and help me with time boxing.

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Amazon's Kindle 2 Starts A Fire

I've had Amazon's Kindle 2 for the past couple of weeks, and I am really glad I bought one. I thought I'd take some time to share what I've found with you in case you're considering buying one.

First, I'd like to give you some context to better understand where I'm coming from.

  • Contrary to my gadget-loving nature I didn't buy the first Kindle (though I was chomping at the bit to pick up version 2).
  • This is my first time using an electronic reader, and I've never liked reading long documents (much less books) on a computer.
  • I read quite a few books -- typically 4 or more each month, and usually with more than one going at a time (one or more business / non-fiction, one fiction, etc.).
  • When I travel, I typically have 3 or 4 books with me which can be heavy and bulky.

The Device

I'll start with my impressions of the device itself. Amazon took a cue from Apple and really paid attention to the "unboxing experience" with the Kindle. The elegantly boxed arrived and I felt like I was opening a gift, rather than just some gadget I ordered. The fit & finish are impressive - this is a sturdy, light device - and it has a nice minimalist feel. The only items you need to carry around are the Kindle itself (about as big a footprint as a Moleskine notebook, but thinner than an iPhone), a USB cable that you use for charging and connecting to your PC, and a USB-to-AC adapter so you can charge via an electrical outlet).

I added Amazon's protective leather cover for the Kindle 2, which about doubles the thickness of the device but gives me peace of mind that it won't get dinged up as I carry the Kindle around. Click the image at right for a larger view of all the gear together.

Obtaining Stuff to Read

One of the things that's been a breeze is buying books for the Kindle. The device is integrated seamlessly with my Amazon account, so I can:

  • Buy Kindle books via the Amazon web site, and they show up seconds later on my Kindle 2
  • Browse or search for books on the Kindle, order (with automatic billing to my account)

These are the two most common actions, but there are other ways to get content to read, including:

  • You can email PDF's and Word docs to yourself and (for a cost of 10 cents) they will be converted and appear on your Kindle a few minutes later. If you are a GTD user, this could be an effective way to bring your "To Read" stack with you without adding bulk to your briefcase. You can also add others to your email "good list" so they can send you documents this way.
  • You can subscribe to newspapers (of which there are quite a few) or magazines (there aren't many) from Amazon's Kindle Store.
  • You can subscribe to a small number of leading blogs (more are purportedly coming) so you can read your RSS feeds on the go.
  • You can get free books via ManyBooks - they have Kindle format versions of many books from Project Gutenberg.
    • ManyBooks has over 20,000 free eBooks available, and a bunch of them are available in Kindle format (.awz files).
    • You can also browse to "mnybks.net" from your Kindle to download from ManyBooks directly on the device.
    • If you download the books to your PC, you have to manually copy them to your Kindle 2 via the USB cable but hey - they're free!

In addition to reading, you can listen to things on the Kindle in a couple of ways:

  • Have the Kindle read a book to you in its robot voice (I'm not wild about the voice, but it might be good in some situation I haven't yet encountered).
  • Copy MP3's to your Kindle (again, via USB) so you can listen to music or audiobooks on the device. Warning: MP3 files take a lot of space (but Kindle format books do not).

Book prices are reasonable. First, you can download samples of books to decide whether you want them or not. When you buy, most current / hardcover titles cost $10, while older / massmarket paperback books range from free to about $8 (most of the massmarket books I've bought run about $6 or $7).

The best thing? The Kindle weighs the same and takes up the same amount of space no matter how many books you put in it.

OK, So What About the Reading?

Now, let's get into the reason I bought this device: the reading. In short, "wow - this is cool, and better than I expected." You start with a home page that shows you all of the books currently on your Kindle, with a small, graphical indicator of how much you've read. When you find what you want to read, point to it using the joystick and press in on the joystick to select. Boom - the book comes up on the screen and you're ready to read.

The controls on the Kindle 2 are easy to use and you forget about them after a few minutes of reading (you'll mostly use the Previous and Next Page buttons). At any time, you can mark text, add annotations, add a bookmark, or look up a word using the built-in dictionary. You can also switch to another book, and the Kindle 2 will remember where you left off any time you return to a book already in progress. Very nice.

The on-screen reading experience is surprisingly good. I have read for up to 4 hours at a stretch with no eye fatigue, and find I can read faster on the Kindle than I can using a "real" book. I suspect it's because I can adjust the text to a size that's optimal and because the whitespace around the screen makes it easier to focus on the page that's before me.

The annotation tools are handy, too. Since I often review the books I read (or at least the ones I like), I find myself using the highlights a lot and they're a snap to use on the Kindle 2. In the screen shot at the right, you can get an idea of how easy it is to keep track of multiple highlights and annotations - click the pic for a larger view (and please excuse the wonky angle - I didn't get the camera straight).

Net-net on the Kindle 2

Once again, I'm really glad I bought the Kindle 2. If you read a lot, you'll love this device - and I think heavy readers will be able to justify the expensive price much more easily. There are so many things I haven't even mentioned in this review, but hopefully you've heard enough to get an idea whether this device is right for you or not. If you still want one, pick one up a Kindle 2 from Amazon - and happy reading!

And here are my top 5 pros and cons, to wrap things up.


Kindle 2: Top 5 Pros

Kindle 2: Bottom 5 Cons

Excellent, readable screen with adjustable font size

Expensive

Seamless integration with Amazon account

Joystick is a little stubby and harder to use than I'd like

Huge library of current (and older) books available on-demand

Battery and memory are not user-accessible

Very portable form factor, even with charging cable

No ability to password protect the device or its ability to order
(though you can disable it via Amazon.com if it's stolen)

Easy bookmarking, highlighting, and annotation

Not enough magazines available for subscription yet


Memopal: An interesting online backup option

As you may be aware (since I've written about Mozy in the past), I use Mozy to backup my home computers because I like the ease and peace of mind that comes from automatic, off-site backups.

Recently, I've had the privilege of trying out another online backup product called "Memopal. " I've been running on one of my computers for a couple of months, and it has some interesting characteristics that really impressed me:

  • Memopal allows you to back up as many systems as you'd like for one fee, because you buy a 'pool' of storage rather than a licenser per computer.
    • You pay $49 per year for 150 Gigs of storage, $99 per year for 250 Gigs (they offer discounts for multiple years).
  • Memopal allows you to share files with other people through their service. This is a very handy way to share really large files with other people without clogging up email.
    • In Windows, you simply right-click on a file on your computer and select "Share" from the Memopal menu. There is similar functionality with their Mac client.
    • You are given the option to share the file for 1 day, 1 week, or unlimited (you can revoke sharing at any time).
  • Memopal has an impressive array of supported platforms: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003, Mac, Linux, and iPhone (yes, iPhone!)

If you don't have a backup solution already, Memopal is a good one to consider and I've been happy with the performance, functionality and ease-of-use during the 2 months I've used the product.

At this point, I'm not going to convert any of my other systems from Mozy to Memopal since I'm still quite happy with Mozy and it meets my needs (plus I still have over a year on my contract). However, I think Memopal is raising the bar on economical, online backups and when my Mozy contracts are up... who knows?

Money-saving tip: Memopal is also currently offering an "Easter special" through April 25, that will save you 15%.

So many choices - what do I do?

Now - if you're trying to decide between Mozy and Memopal, I have some additional thoughts to consider:

  • Company
    • Backing
      • Mozy is part of megacorp EMC, while Memopal is an angel-funded startup. I'm not overly concerned about this because I have multiple types of backups, but make sure the company you pick is stable.
      • Incidentally, Mozy was a startup when I began using it and when it was acquired by EMC I had two reactions: 1) good, they aren't going anywhere, and 2) I hope EMC doesn't raise the price. [EMC did raise the price for business accounts, by the way.]
    • Company location
      • If this is an issue for you, make sure you understand it. Mozy is US-based, while Memopal is Rome-based.
  • Terms of use and policies
    • Both Mozy and Memopal are very clear about their policies, terms of use, etc. and both have very "user-friendly" policies. I've looked at other services where this was not the case.
  • How you'll use the product
    • If you regularly need to share large files with others, Memopal does that while Mozy does not.
    • Platform support may be a consideration - ensure that the platforms you intend to back up are supported (for example, Mozy will not back up Linux or iPhone).
  • Pricing subleties
    • If you are only backing up one system, Mozy and Memopal will cost you about the same per year. If, however, you are backing up multiple systems Memopal can be quite a bit cheaper.
    • The caveat here is that Memopal will charge you more if you outgrow the capacity you've purchased.
      • For example, if you are backing up 2 computers that (combined) have less than 150 Gigs of data, Memopal will be cheaper; if those same 2 computers require you to bump your storage up to 250 Gigs, the price will be the same (and Mozy provides unlimited storage).
    • Bottom line on pricing: Think about it and do the math before you jump in.
  • Try it before you buy it
    • Both Mozy and Memopal offer free trials - give them a test drive before you purchase to make sure you'll be happy.

I hope this information is helpful in your decision - whichever one of these products you choose, I think you'll be happy with the choice.

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Pause and Resume

PauseDisabled You may have noticed that I’ve been a bit quieter than usual here of late.  You see, I’ve been dealing with the illness and death of my father-in-law, and I pressed the “Pause” button while traveling this past week for his funeral.  He was a wonderful man - we will miss him, and I will be forever shaped by the beautiful example of his life.

While I have your attention, I might as well give you an idea of what you can expect in the near future as I press Play again:

  • Playicon I’ll share my early experience with Amazon’s Kindle 2;
  • I’ll (of course) review a number of books, including one that provides a very intriguing alternative to GTD;
  • I’ll review a backup service that provides an interesting alternative to Mozy;
  • I’ll be sharing more about some interesting gadgets and travel tips;
  • And more.

Also, if you have feedback on what you like or don’t like here (more of x; less of y; etc.) drop me a line (Email Me).

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Trippin’ with TripIt

A while back, my friend Phil Gerbyshak (aka. The Make It Great guy) suggested tripit_logo_tagunder_250I check out a travel site  called TripIt.  The service allows you to “connect” with people you trust and share travel itineraries.  At the time, I was busy and wasn’t too sure about the idea of yet another social networking kind of thing.

In December, the siren’s call of TripIt pulled me in and I started using it. I’m now hooked.

So – what does TripIt do?  I’m greatly simplifying the power of TripIt, but I think of it as a database that tracks two things about you:  Where you are (or will be), and what you’re doing (or planning to do) while you’re traveling.  It compares your trips to those of other people you’re connected to (more on that in a minute) and lets you know when you’ll be near someone you know.  That makes it simple to plan ahead and arrange a get-together if you so desire.

Let me tell you a bit about how it works…

Getting your trips in

Letting TripIt know where you’ll be couldn’t be much simpler.  You have two choices:

  1. (the easiest) Forward a copy of your travel itinerary (or confirmation email) to plans@tripit.com.  They’ll process it and automagically add the trip to your account (they know who you are because you associate one or more email addresses with your account).
  2. (only slightly more difficult) Go to the TripIt site and click one of the “Add Trip” buttons.  You then manually provide a few pieces of information about your trip and it will be added to your account.

Pretty simple.  And if you have an oddly formatted itinerary that it can’t handle, you get an email notifying you there was a problem.

Making connections

whoscloseTripIt is strictly an “opt in” kind of service.  You need to invite others (or be invited by them) to connect and give permission to share trip information.   TripIt makes things easy here, too.  You can invite people manually, use their “find people using TripIt” wizard, or use TripIt’s application in LinkedIn (I’ve used a combination of all three).

TripIt analyzes all of trips you and your connections will be taking, which enables some cool things:

  • You are notified when friends are planning to visit your hometown (including telling you whether you’ll be in town that day or not)
  • You get a dashboard of what upcoming trips are happening the next few weeks in your network, which allows you to recommend things for them to do while traveling
  • You automatically create a history of your travel including a running total of your miles traveled
  • You get a pre-trip reminder that your trip is about to start, along with average temperatures for your destination
  • and more…

Oh, and TripIt is free.

My verdict

I like TripIt much more than I ever expected to.  I’ve already made some connections I wouldn’t have otherwise made during my travels even though I’ve only been using the service for about 2 months.  The two things that really made it easy for me are the ability to email itineraries for processing (that makes it so easy to use TripIt), and the integration with LinkedIn (one of the few social networks I use consistently).  Simplicity is key.

If you travel quite a bit (or know people who do – remember, it will tell you when they come to your town) I recommend you give TripIt a try.

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