Month: July 2016
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Taking advantage of the herd mentality
It is a sad truth, people go in herds. There are obviously some early adopters, but the majority of people do not want to be the first one to do something, even if it is clearly a good thing to do. Case in point: The NFL Draft. It has been studied and proven that the…
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Verizon didn’t exactly buy Yahoo
In the news today it says “Verizon Announces $4.8 Billion Deal for Yahoo’s Internet Business” and “Verizon Buys Yahoo for $4.83B”. This confused me at first because Yahoo has over 40 billion in assets. Then I read the article and realized that Verizon bought the operating business but NOT the capital and assets. Here is…
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The Uncanny Valley
The Uncanny Valley used in reference to the phenomenon whereby a computer-generated figure or humanoid robot bearing a near-identical resemblance to a human being arouses a sense of unease or revulsion in the person viewing it. In other words, the uncanny valley is when something looks close to the real thing but our brain freaks…
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There are two kinds of people…
Of course there aren’t, but it is a great way to simplify decisions. Break down the problem to two kinds of people and decide which one you want to optimize for. Some examples: There are two kinds of people… Those that wants their inbox to be empty except new things and those that let’s their inbox…
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Pokemon Go is already over
The speed of memes has been rising exponentially since the industrial revolution. When I was a child and a new idea or fad became popular it would take 1-2 years for the idea to spread and take a few more years for it to become officially dead. Just look at mullets from the 80’s! Last week…
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Product Responsibility Framework v0.1
UPDATE: New Version v0.2 I’ve been thinking about how product teams are organized. I have seen several good frameworks out there, but none felt quite right to me. There are traditional models, but of course, I want to try something new. I took the framework from Pragmatic Marketing and started moving things around. I put the…
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Managing via Dials
Often, I will have feedback for a product manager, marketer or designer when they are writing text. I find that people have a hard time taking the feedback in a very specific way. If you say it’s too serious, they assume you want to take it to the extreme. As if there are only 2…
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Even Slack can have bad UX
Even a tool that is awesome like Slack can have bad UX sometimes. Here is a perfect example. Try to make a new channel and you get this dialog Notice the error in yellow and the text underneath. After typing in my channel name, I pressed submit and nothing happened. I didn’t notice the italic/bold yellow verbose…
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Cyberbullying
Being the target of a bully sucks. I recently heard of someone who was being bullied on an online social site. Here are some trademark qualities of the bully: They create fake accounts to hide their identity Their comments are cruel and seek to de-humanize their victim They do it in a public forum meant…
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Framing the Problem
Quick Story There once were two school children who loved listening to their new punk music. Like all school kids, they also had alot of homework to do. The first kid asks his parent, “While I am doing my homework, may I also listen to my music?” The parent says, “No concentrate on your homework!” The second kid sees…