Recent Reads

ONE | Mommy Mixer
Picture a roomful of Moms with a flock of Nannies and there you have a Mommy Mixer. This is a remarkable business where Moms gather to meet, greet, and interview potential Nannies for their children. Learn about the Mommy Mixer story here and check out MommyMixer.com.

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TWO | Ping-Pong as Mind Game
Little known fact about me … in my teens I played lots of table tennis. LOTS. I was infatuated with the game. Practiced and played all the time until I became pretty good. Wicked serves, strong backhand defense, and one hella forehand slam. Given that … I thoroughly enjoyed this article about Ping-Pong as Mind-Game. I also enjoyed this article because I learned puzzle master Will Shortz is a competitive table tennis player. (My Mom was an avid crossword puzzler and a Will Shortz devotee. So nice to think of my Mom when I read that article.) >> READ MORE

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THREE | The Evil Genius of Apple
Leander Kahney has written a provocative article—How Apple Got Everything Right by Doing Everything Wrong. In today’s open source transparent co-creation business culture, Apple is the antithesis. Apple is opaque. Apple favors closed platforms. Apple doesn’t actively solicit feedback from its fans. Yet, the company succeeds. Interesting read. And, Scott Berkun’s rebuttal is also an interesting read.

Comments

[Zane Safrit]

Given the community of Apple's fans, and the ability of Apple to delight them...fairly often...there's some feedback mechanism in play. And it's a two-way mechanism. But a transparent discussion would be the proverbial double-edged sword: wonderful(ly) never-ending, adelight for those who indulge in blue-sky dialogues; a nightmare for those who seek to finish a product and get it out to market to ahem drive revenues to fund another round of innovations and also to serve as a full-blown beta product.

It's a captivating process they have, one of mystery and delight it seems. The wizard...but somewhere in that process is a conversation with users and testers. It's just better managed both in how they allow the conversation and how they limit it.

[Al Moore]

I can vouch for John's table tennis abilities. I used to beat him so regularly that he quit. What I didn't know was that he was practicing somewhere. Six months or so later, he challenged me. I never won again. It goes to show you, if you really work hard at what you do, you can come out on top. There's a lesson here somewhere.

[johnmoore (from Brand Autopsy)]

A little more background is needed to tell the full story behind my Dad’s comment above. In the early 80s, my Dad took me on a rafting trip down the Taos River in New Mexico. We stayed at hotel with a ping-pong table and we played a couple of games. My Dad SMOKED me. Using rustic sandpaper paddles, my Dad goosed the ball with so much spin I didn’t know how to react.

Later on I learned my Dad played table tennis during his teenage years in Jackson, MS. At the time I only thought he played just tennis and not also table tennis.

A year or so after the Taos trip, my Dad bought the family a ping-ping table with some rubber blades. (Yes blades, not paddles.) We played a lot and he would beat me silly. I decided to get serious. I checked-out a book at the library on how to play table tennis. I learned how to do some wicked serves and load up the ball with topspin. Once schooled, I began to school my Dad. We had some great times playing some super-competitive games.

My table tennis game improved from reading a book but it also improved playing thousands of games with Eddie Compton. Eddie was a good friend of mine back then and we would play all the time. Eddie pushed me to be a better player and I did the same with him. Once Eddie and I were playing at a different level, my Dad couldn’t compete.

Now … Eddie’s Dad, Ogden Compton, was a tremendous table tennis player. He used to play in tournaments and when we all would play Doubles, the Comptons would beat the Moores.

Fun memories.

[Ivan]

I read that Wired article on Apple a couple of weeks ago. While the rebuttal does have some merit, I cant agree that company culture is overlooked. Apple's corporate culture is legendary in its two basic points of:

+working harder than you thought you could
+thinking of your work as art
+what Steve says goes

With great emphasis on the last one. The article does raise some questions on apple's future though.

I wrote more about it here if you care to read:
http://ivanismo.com/?p=27

[Ivan]

Haha make that 3 basic points!

[Maddison]

I love Table Tennis! I'm glad you called it that an not Ping Pong ;). Ping Pong is a garage sport, Table Tennis is an Olympic Sport. It brings back lots of memories for me as well in my childhood years. I've actually been getting getting back into it recently, and taking lessons once a week. Boy did I have a lot to change!!!