No. 47 | Seven genetically modified food ideas
If we’re going to engineer our fruit and vegetable crops let’s have some fun with it, is all I’m saying.
I have blogged intermittently since the mid 90s. Thankfully, much of the early teenage angst is lost to time. This collects my writings from this site, an earlier personal website, and some newsletter projects over the years, in mostly chronological order. I also publish new writing here. I publish somewhat more formal writing about content strategy and design careers at Content Career Accelerator.
Put the Work Before the Words
Don’t let vocabulary or office politics get you down. Your content strategy work is relevant, no matter what words are tied to it.
stopit, Golden Principles, and the Golden Bridge
One my favorite talks I give is about making Dale Carnegie’s 9 Golden Principles for Being a Friendlier Person an accessible idea for UX designers. The first principle is often one of the hardest to adhere to, both IRL and on the web: Never criticize, condemn, or complain. When a user does something we perceive … continue
How I put together my latest workshop
I did a completely new workshop (and related talk) at Confab this year. By completely new, I mean: Not upcycled from a talk I’ve already given Not an evolution on a previous talk or workshop Not based on a blog post or other writing So new, new, new. It was a lot of work. Confab … continue
Conference diary: Confab 2018
Holy shit. So was that a conference or was that a conference? I’m still reeling from the end of Confab 2018, a (the) content strategy conference held annually here in Minneapolis, Minnesota. My employer, Brain Traffic, produces the event. My primary contribution leading up to Confab is to interject unasked-for advice into conversations I overhear … continue
Sketching a blog post
Used a couple of Sharpie twin tips and my Baron Fig Mastermind pad to prototype my latest post for the Brain Traffic blog. Normally when I use pen and paper in my writing workflow it’s very messy and haphazard — notes jotted in random places, maybe a partial mind map, maybe a bullet point of … continue
Markdown in Ulysses share sheet
Was delighted to find that Markdown formatting even works when sending things to Ulysses from other applications. Perhaps this is common for iPad apps but it was the first time I’ve noticed it. Many of my posts start from the camera roll. It’s great to be able to do some quick formatting and position the … continue
Tiny habits with Streaks
I tried Streaks (what an awful name) a while back but it didn’t stick, I think because I picked overly-ambitious things to track. The gang was talking about it recently on Do By Friday and I gave it another spin. It’s clicking this time. This is my current mix: I’ve been try to pick habits … continue
Sometimes words are best
I like when designers solve problems with words in a straightforward and simple way. I nearly opened the wrong end of this carton of heavy cream. But then I saw the all-caps instructions to OPEN OTHER END. So I did. Not hard to imagine a designer using an illustration (which you’d probably decrypt right after … continue
How to Use a Content Ecosystem Map
What do you do with that shiny new content ecosystem map you’ve created? Here’s how to effectively put your map into practice.