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.

 

"Outliers" really stands out

I've enjoyed Malcolm Gladwell's books in the past (I thought "The Tipping Point" was excellent, but thought "Blink" was just Ok in comparison). I just finished reading "Outliers" and it is by far my favorite Gladwell book so far (on a side note, it's also the first book I read on the Kindle 2).

In Outliers, Gladwell seeks to understand why some people excel in life. Is it "natural talent and ability?" Is it hard work? Is it luck? Can it be replicated?

Fascinating case studies

The reason I enjoyed this book is that it presents intriguing findings woven into fascinating stories. Some of the topics include a discussion of lots of odd phenomena and stereotypes:

  • Is there a "best" time to have been born?
  • Are the most successful people those with the highest IQ's?
  • Why are so many successful professional hockey players born early in the year?
  • Are Asians really better at math? Why or why not?
  • Do lower income students tend to do worse, academically, than those from higher income families?
  • Why are there so many Jewish lawyers in New York?
  • Does ethnicity play into likelihood of plane crashes?
  • Why were the Beatles, Bill Gates, and Bill Joy so successful and influential?

The answers to all of these - and more - are covered in this book. Or at least Gladwell's convincing theories are covered!

Engaging reading

Gladwell has perfected the art of drawing you into an intriguing story, then presenting a research-based analysis of why things occurred the way they did, the interactions & influences that were involved, and giving some serious "think about" material.

The best thing about the stories is that they feature real people, including Gladwell's own family. Comparing the opinions, thoughts, and actions with how things turned out can be fascinating - you can see the flaws in some of the thinking, but can also see how you may have made the same flawed decisions if you were immersed in the same situation.

Still not convinced?

I searched this book for a short example I could share in this review to get you jazzed about the book, but they were hard to condense into a paragraph or two. So, here is something to chew on that might get you thinking:

  • Gladwell analyzed the 75 wealthiest people in history - starting with Cleopatra and the Pharaohs of ancient times (Bill Gates is #37 on that list, incidentally, when the wealth figures are normalized)
  • Fourteen of these 75 are Americans born within 9 years of each other in the mid-nineteenth century - that's almost 20% of the wealthiest people in thousands of years - all born in a historical blink of an eye

Curious how that happened? You'll find out in this book. And it relates to the answers to most of the questions I listed above.

If you haven't done so yet, I recommend you read Outliers - and I'd love to hear whether you enjoyed it as much as I did.

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Taking things for granted

On a lighter note, I just got a link from my friend Gene Kim (who sorta has a blog about Goldratt’s Theory of Constraints, if one post qualifies).

The link is to a Conan O’Brien segment with the truly hilarious comedian Louis CK, who’s describing how everything in the world is awesome but nobody is satisfied.

You can watch the video below, or click this link to go to YouTube to watch.

This is must-see PC, believe me.  Enjoy!

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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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Laugh to death by PowerPoint

I’m always on the lookout for ways to make PowerPoint more interesting.  In the past, that’s been things like using “Beyond Bullet Points” and whatnot.  Here’s another idea:  be funny.

I stumbled across the YouTube channel of a comedian named Tim Lee, who uses PowerPoint in his act – and he is very good! Check out the video below (or use this link).  If you like it, be sure and subscribe to Tim Lee’s YouTube channel.  Enjoy!

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