Archive for the ‘Productivity’ Category
How I wasted my morning reading RSS feeds
If you’ve dabbled into anything web 2.0, you know a major plus for aggregating all your social and informational needs is through RSS feeds. We have one too, right here. So how many are you subscribed to, 10? 50? 100? 1000? I actually know some people that have thousands and they just sit there reading them for countless hours like I just did. Don’t.
Many people get the feeling that they “have to read everything or else miss out on something” or there are others who don’t read them for a long time and go on binges of a million posts at a time. Both ways are wrong and waste valuable time.
The idea for RSS feeds was for updates to come to you rather than you refresh at a page for updates. It became a huge convenience for people that track lots of websites but with more information, we feel more compelled to digest all that information. Once again, don’t.
Most if not all RSS readers have this magic little button called “Mark all as read”. If you are the awkward type that have never clicked on this before, what it does is magically clears all your RSS feeds to “read”. Go on, try it now, I promise it’s painless.
When I was away last week I had over 1500 updates stockpiled up and was afraid to let it all go. I thought “oh no, all that valuable information will be lost, all those tips, videos, photos, interesting tidbits… well my life will go on” and magically my RSS reader was clean.
If you still feel uncomfortable getting rid of all your unread feeds, then try a folder management system. Seen in the picture above, I categorize with:
- Daily Read
- Random Updates
- Skim
- Unimportant
~Kevin Xu
Always keep it simple
Uncomplicated, straightforward, austere, smooth, easy, simple.
Everyone likes it when things are simple. From web design to project assignments to blog posts. Simplicity has that rare beauty to delight the eyes and at the same time convey info.
Sadly the world is not always simple and but it is up to web designers to at least make the virtual world simpler. A favorite example of mine is Google, I mean have you seen their homepage? You go to Google to search and it lets you make a search without distraction. Easy, straight-to-the-point, simple.
Recently I received a certificate from Google for participating in the GHOP contest I mentioned earlier and I love it’s design.
Clean and simple, done
There’s absolutely no need for colorful backgrounds or random images to make it look “pretty”. It’s a certificate with my name, the contest, and a signature and I’m happy with it.
So with that in mind, we want to make “Can The World Hear Me” as simple as possible. Wordpress is the master at aggregating and automating many parts of the blog but sometimes it gets cluttered. Fortunately everything is customizable. Uncluttering the website and making the content stand out is our current goal.
And to our new readers and old readers― we have revised the point of this blog to its simplest form:
A chronicle of two boys’ journey to leave their mark on the world
~Kevin Xu
P.S. If anyone wants a really simple blog, Tumblr is the way to go. Simple design and simple posts give a whole feeling of calmness. I’m even considering creating a personal blog using Tumblr ;D
What problems can we solve? (Part 3)
As I said in a previous post, the purpose of a business should be to make meaning rather than to make money. Great companies create innovative solutions to some of the simplest problems. Google solved the search problem. Wikipedia solved the knowledge problem. And Facebook solved the connection problem. They each established their solutions into a unique niche which benefited everyone else and in return benefited them.
So what problems are left that we can solve? I’m not afraid to list them off because competition is always going to be there no matter what niche we decide to enter. Unless we come up with a niche that no one has entered yet, then we might keep that a secret ;D
Sleep- People today of all ages need more sleep. Some people have no problem waking up early but most people do like the idea of sleeping for 12 hours straight. With the way today’s society works (early work hours, few breaks, exhausted nights) it seems like there’s no time to sleep. It seems like a continuous cycle of dragging yourself out of bed, trying to make it through the whole day, and then overloaded with work at home so you don’t get enough sleep for the next day. Why do we make ourselves suffer through this and can a web-based startup fix this?
Stress- Kinda goes with the sleep problem but more to do with the human psyche. Whether it is taking a test, submitting a report, or public speaking, people get very nervous these days and stressed. It all comes down to the fact that we care too much. If you were speaking to a teddy bear, you wouldn’t be stressed at all but if you spoke to George Bush (kinda like an oversized teddy bear) you would be a little more stressed. So can a web-based startup fix this?
Organization- One of my personal strengths is organization and from that, I can see how messy a lot of other people’s lives are. Web-based programs have tried and tried again to devise a solution to this but can we come up with something that works?
Tech-savvyness- A lot of people in this world still aren’t tech-savvy and think a computer is doing ‘magic’. They believe it is only the nerds and geeks that know the inner workings of a computer but everyone is able to know how it works. People don’t necessarily need to know how it works but how to use it to its full capacity. Maybe a culmination of the inner workings of the web?
Boredom- There are also the people in this world that are bored a lot. They need a meaningless distraction of fun for them to get through the day. Besides conventional forms of entertainment like movies or games, maybe they need something even more meaningless?
Money- Yeah, everyone still wants money…
I guess when it comes down to it, it’s all about productivity. Google made searching easier and quicker and so does Wikipedia and Facebook for what they do. Easier and quicker. Making life easier and quicker seems the viable solution to all these problems.
So these are just a few of the problems I could think of at this moment. There are bounds more and maybe I’ll add them to this post or make another post about it. Until then, stay tuned for Part 4- What are the solutions to these problems?
Previously:
Why form a startup? (Part 1)
Why use web 2.0? (Part 2)
~Kevin X
How To: Get 25 Hours a Day
It seems like everyone is so pressured for time these days that I am going to give my own little guide on how to hack more hours out of a day. This is going to be different than those other guides online and I’m going to make this as quick and simple as possible so I don’t waste your time by reading this.
- Work Faster- This might seem simple but you’d be surprised how many people don’t do it. Just convince your mind that you are constantly on caffeine or steroids and you’ll get a lot more work done.
- Wake Up Earlier- For some reason people are more productive in the morning than at night. Maybe it is because you are starting a fresh day instead of having been through a whole day.
- Have Fun and Enjoy It- You know the phrase “Time flies when you’re having fun?” So when you are having fun, realize it and enjoy it to its full potential. Make every minute of fun last an hour.
- Prioritize Your Needs- Know what is important and do that first. But usually the important stuff is the hardest stuff so that brings me to my next point.
- Tell that voice in your head to shut up- When the hardest task comes up we usually say to ourselves “maybe I’ll do that later…” Well tell that voice to shut up and do whatever you have to do. Once you get started, you really get in the mood and it will get done.
- Get off the internet- Except this blog, keep reading this blog =D
Hopefully by following these simple steps, you can get that extra hour out of your day that you always wanted otherwise try polyphasic sleep. Especially for students, a term paper or a final exam needs as much time as possible so get to it
~Kevin X