A new Firefox plugin called Firesheep makes it dead easy for both the curious and ill-intentioned to log into your accounts by spying on your traffic on an open WiFi network. Firesheep uses a technique called “sidejacking.” Github has a good technical explanation if you’re interested.

Hotels, airports, and coffee houses are all places where you're likely to encounter risky open networks. But really any network (free or paid) outside of your home or business is risky because you simply don’t know who (or what) else is swimming in the pond.

How to protect yourself

• Use a VPN. Mashable recently published a post on how to protect yourself from Firesheep using a VPN.

• Use a MiFi. I usually have my Virgin Mobile MiFi with me during the day, and I always take it on trips. Not only is it way cheaper than hotel WiFi, it’s secure.

• Tether. Most smartphones let you use them as a modem nowadays. It may be slower than WiFi, but it’s safe and secure like the MiFi.

• Limit your time connected. Get in, get out. Limit your exposure. It’s okay to turn off your MacBook’s AirPort every now and then. I’ve done it and lived to tell about it.

• Think, wait. Does it have to be done right now? Can it wait until you get home? Is it worth the risk?

Let me know how you protect yourself on open networks.

You may have thought, the last time you blew off work on a presentation to watch “How I Met Your Mother,” that you were just slacking. But from another angle you were actually engaging in a practice that illuminates the fluidity of human identity and the complicated relationship human beings have to time.

This is but one insight in a marvelous piece called “Later” that James Surowiecki wrote for The New Yorker. The article is partly a review of a new book called The Thief of Time, a collection of essays on the subject of procrastination.

What is procrastination?

… if you’re simply saying “Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die,” you’re not really procrastinating. Knowingly delaying because you think that’s the most efficient use of your time doesn’t count, either.

Rather,

The essence of procrastination lies in not doing what you think you should be doing, a mental contortion that surely accounts for the great psychic toll the habit takes on people. This is the perplexing thing about procrastination: although it seems to involve avoiding unpleasant tasks, indulging in it generally doesn’t make people happy.

The extended will

Another important concept that Surowiecki eloquently describes is “the extended will,” a phrase coined by Joseph Heath and Joel Anderson. It describes “external tools and techniques to help the parts of our selves that want to work.”

How strong is your extended will?

Earlier I wrote about the need to exercise care when putting future objects in your path. Before digital productivity systems, we were forced to do this.

But these days, ubiquitous task systems can quickly turn into instruments of self-flagellation for the productivity zealot. Modern productivity tools invite you to task everything. And when you don’t, can’t, or simply lose the will to get it all done, you feel like shit.

Is your task system making you more productive happier?

Seriously, think about it. If you check off nine out of ten things, what lingers in your head at the end of the day? The nine successes or the one "failure?"

When nailing nine out of ten feels worse than three out of three, it's not a productivity failure; it's a failure of conscience.

Procrastination as an asset

In the past year, I’ve learned that procrastination is a voice that should not be ignored. If interpreted correctly, it can actually be very helpful in figuring out what shouldn’t be done.

That voice of guilt may really be a voice of reason.

Procrastination is a guiding light that you should follow regularly – maybe once a week. Follow it to the delete button. Let it help you find the waste on your task list. Let it help you focus on the things that mean the most to you.

Think of [tasks] as ducks you want to shoot rather than raise. -Merlin Mann

It's time to put some ducks (and you) out of misery.

This stuff is more important than ever

Surowiecki notes that “the percentage of people who admitted to difficulties with procrastination quadrupled between 1978 and 2002.”

In the last year or so, I've begun to surmise that computers are the source of our obsession with multitasking and hyper-productivity. Computers are quite good at multitasking and unconditionally taking orders. People, not so much. But people learn by example, and many of us observe computers all day long.

We shape our tools. And then our tools shape us. -Marshal McLuhan

Communicate, listen (to yourself)

The next time you feel guilty about not getting something done, listen to that voice more closely. Consider why you didn’t get it all done. Question whether the thing you skipped was really worth doing anyway.

Question the reach of your extended will.

And add a little hedonism to your workflow. Why the hell not? Doing the things you want to do is not always a bad thing. In fact, it may ultimately be the path of least resistance to success.

Let me know how you really feel about procrastination.

What do these four things have in common?

1. You should save more money.
2. You should eat healthier foods.
3. You should tell your family you love them more often.
4. You should back up your data.

Answer: They’re all things that people should do, but most don’t. Are most people fundamentally irrational? Maybe. But more likely, it’s just that adults don’t have anyone to make them do the things that they’re too inert to do on their on.

We all routinely trade long-term value for fleeting conveniences. It’s actually quite human and definitely predates the need for things like digital backups. The Greeks called it akrasia, the state of acting against one’s better judgment.

Now, there’s no way I’m going to take on all four of the do’s up above (at least not today). So I’ll just address the last one.

I’m going to talk about characteristics of a good data backup plan, how I do it specifically, and most importantly why my workflow works for me: It fits into my life and creates a form of positive inertia. I know it works because I’ve been doing it long enough to be numb to it.

Characteristics of a good data backup plan

• It should be easy to execute so that it actually happens.
• It should have redundancy (multiple copies of your data).
• The frequency should balance practicality with your needs.
• The process should be efficient in cost and time spent.
• A copy of your data should be in at least two separate physical locations (e.g. home and office).
• It should be easy to load your data onto a new computer if necessary.

Core tools in my personal backup strategy

• The cloud (Dropbox)
• Time Machine + Time Capsule
• Carbon Copy Cloner + USB hard drives

Dropbox

Dropbox syncs several folders containing my working documents. It’s mostly text files, word processor files, spreadsheets, and PDFs. My 1Password keychain is also in Dropbox.

I find that Dropbox works damn near flawlessly to keep my files in sync. Benefits of Dropbox go well beyond being simply a backup system, but backing up is my focus today.

Benefits of Dropbox as a backup system:

• The basic (2 GB) version is free.
• Versioning lets you easily restore files to any state in the last 30 days.
• It’s fireproof (i.e. it’s offsite and can’t be destroyed by a local disaster).
• Dropbox is very easy to implement and install on a new computer.
• No manual intervention is required. It just works on its own.
• Files can be accessed at any computer with an internet connection.

Disadvantages of Dropbox as a backup system:

• Space is limited on the free version. More space = more money.
• Items in shared folders can be deleted by others.
• You can’t do a full system backup.
• Requires internet connection (sometimes it’s sunny and there are no clouds).

Time Machine + Time Capsule

I run Time Machine hourly and back up over my WiFi network to a Time Capsule. This gives me a running archive of all the data on my Mac – photos, music, files, application settings, etc.

Overall, I’ve been pleased with both Time Machine and the Time Capsule hardware. Both have run reliably for over two years. They’ve also been instrumental in getting me out of a few tight spots.

Benefits of Time Machine as a backup system:

• It will back up your entire hard drive.
• Versioning allows restoration to previous states.
• No manual intervention required. It just works on its own.
• Data stays local (no cloud security issues).
• Does not require internet connection.

Disadvantages of Time Machine as a backup system:

• Space is limited to what’s available on the external hard drive you back up to.
• By default Time Machine runs hourly. This bothers some people. It’s transparent to me, however.
• You can’t create a bootable clone of your hard drive.
• Restoring data to a new computer requires a few extra steps.
• Does not sync multiple Macs.
• Requires either a physical connection (e.g. USB) or wireless connection to Time Capsule.

Carbon Copy Cloner + external hard drives

I use Carbon Copy Cloner (CCC) to create a full, bootable clone of my Mac hard drive. Bootable means that I can actually boot my Mac off of the backup and see my entire system exactly as it was when the backup ran. (This is one of my favorite aspects of the Mac OS.)

It’s worth noting that many people use SuperDuper! instead of CCC. It’s also a great choice, but I’ve always used CCC. It just works, and I haven’t had a reason to change.

I use a simple rotation system with two USB hard drives. I keep one of the hard drives at home. I store the other offsite. I back up to one on the 1st of each month and to the other on the 15th of each month. This gives me a 2-4 week-old full bootable clone of my Mac that I can use at any time.

Some would say that keeping a copy of my data offsite is being overly paranoid. I would say that it’s just common sense, if not a modern necessity.

As we store more and more of our lives in data, it’s important to make sure the data could survive things that happen every day in the world. Things that we don’t like to think about… like fires, theft, and floods. And fast forward 5-10 years from now. Eventually you’ll have a lifetime of photos stored digitally. Imagine if you lost them. Sickening.

Some people use online services for the purpose of backing up large quantities of data. Mozy and BackBlaze are good examples.

I chose my manual system because it avoids cloud data security issues and it’s also more cost effective. Buying a couple of USB hard drives is cheaper than paying a monthly fee indefinitely.

Restoring data from a physical drive that’s in your possession is also way faster than downloading it over the internet.

Ad hoc backups

Anytime I do a major upgrade on my MacBook Pro, I make a full bootable clone of my hard drive beforehand.

I also use a PC for a few specific activities, but they occur infrequently. Any data too large for Dropbox gets copied to an external hard drive or FTP server manually.

The important part: Why this system works for me

In a nutshell, my backup workflow works because it’s become a mindless rhythm in my life. Dropbox and Time Machine work with virtually no assistance on my part. They do their thing without imposing any friction whatsoever on my work.

My external hard drive rotation is the most manual part of my backup workflow. To ensure that it happens on schedule, I’m assisted by my trusty task system, Remember the Milk.

For the hard drive that I keep at home, I simply set a reminder once a month. For the drive I store offsite, I use several bite-sized tasks that happen over a two-day period:

1. Get drive
2. Back up to drive
3. Store drive again

Maybe this is too much detail, but I thought it was worth mentioning how I designate specific, actionable tasks to carry out the back up. By breaking the process into small, simple actions, I increase the chances that I will do those actions consistently in the long run. And I have.

Positive inertia.

What about you?

How do you keep your data backed up?

What practical balance did you strike?

Do you have any data loss horror stories to share?

Doug, a PE reader that I recently had the pleasure of meeting through email, showed me how he pulled the plug on his home phone. Go check it out. I think it’s a great example of how you can rid your life and workflows of nuisances that you may implicitly accept now. Specifically, unwanted “junk” calls.

It’s also a great example of using modern technology to cheaply consolidate and simplify your life.

I’ve not managed to ditch my landline yet, but I have whittled the cost down to a reasonable amount. More importantly, I’m auto-forwarding all inbound calls to a Google Voice number.

Though I’ve not given out my Google Voice number to anyone, I’m using it to create a unified voice mailbox. All of my voicemails go to that same spot. The best part is that I rarely have to listen to voice messages.

Google transcribes the messages and sends them to me via email. I’d much rather read a telemarketer’s call and delete it than have to listen to it over a phone.

I guess it's one way that email is giving back to older forms of communication.

Feel free to share your own tips for streamlining phone and voicemail workflows.

Evolving email is a series about putting yourself in the inbox of the recipient and getting more value out of the time you spend on the task of writing email.

* * *

It’s 4:00 PM, and a you're at work. A 600-word email lands in your inbox. Your heart fills with happiness, your eyes with tears of joy. You can't wait to read it. Maybe you even print it out, make a cup of coffee, and curl up on a sofa to enjoy reading it like your favorite book.

No?

Honestly, I find it very hard to actually read a long email in its entirety (unless of course it's from PE readers, some of the most thoughtful, well-spoken folks in the world). I have particular disdain for bloated emails at work, where messages accumulate like the October oak leaves in my yard right now.

Instead of eagerly reading a long, unsolicited email, I usually scan it. I’m not alone.

Your eyes say it all

Geek alert: I would be very interested to see a study of how people read email – especially in a work setting – but I’ve been unable to find any such studies. (If you find one, let me know.)

I did, however, find a study by Jakob Nielsen that tracked eye movement over email newsletters.

The following “heat map” indicates where people’s eyes spent the most time. Red is the longest, followed by yellow, then blue:

It’s clear that these things attract attention:

• First paragraph
• Headers
• Images

What’s important to me is not really what people see, but what they don’t. The body of a long email is icy blue. It’s pretty chilly out there.

Hold that thought.

The value of another 100 words

In a different analysis, Nielsen also examined how people read web pages. While this second study wasn’t aimed email, I think the concept is easily extended.

He notes that while people certainly spend more time on pages with more words, they only spend 4.4 more seconds for each additional 100 words.

Nielsen also found that the more words a web page has, the fewer words people read as a percentage of the total. It falls very rapidly between 0 and 200 words, too.

In fact, if you want people to read even half of your page, it should have 111 words or less.

Nielsen concludes that users will only read 20% of the text on the average web page.

What does all this mean?

The precision of the numbers in Nielsen’s studies aren’t that important to me. The concepts, however, are.

Here’s the most important one: The more you write in a single email, the more you’re wasting your time.

Let’s define a long email as 600 words. And let’s assume that Wikipedia is correct that the average person types at a rate of 19 words per minute. At that rate, it takes a little over a half hour for the average person to generate a 600-word email. Damn.

So… if you’re spending a lot of time writing things that people aren’t reading anyway, why write them? Why not spend that time on more productive pursuits?

Three practically efficient steps for improvement

Step 1: Recognize the problem

I don’t think anyone ever clicks the “new message” button with the intention of pounding out a novella. Somewhere between realizing that the email needs to be sent and reaching the last line, it just kinda happens.

When it does happen, stop. Don’t click send.

Step 2: Get out your knife

Instead of going for your throat, quickly scan the email, reading the first line of each paragraph. Think about what you would do if someone sent you this monster. Does your message come across?

Cut out the junk that isn’t needed. Or, find the really important parts, and copy them into a new message. Think of that long email as a first draft. Throw it away.

In the end, create a final product that has a high ratio of information to words. Make your message count.

Step 3: Avoid the problem in the future (most important)

The next time you need to write an email – especially in a work situation where important information is being conveyed – try writing your email as a super bare bones outline first.

You can likely save huge amounts of time by simply outlining your thoughts for 30 seconds before releasing the diarrhea of your consciousness into your recipient’s inbox.

Maybe something like this:

* Sales results are in
    * 20% growth

* My interpretations
    * Lower than expected
    * Growth still improving quarter over quarter
    * Better than 2 out of 3 competitors

* Questions/caveats
    * Not sure about data from division 5
    * What are your thoughts?

Once you have an outline, you’ll probably find that you only need a few more words to make it readable (maybe none at all).

In fact, I increasingly leave my emails in an outline form because I think it’s so much easier to digest than stacks of paragraphs – especially when numbers are involved. The * symbol is everyone’s best friend.

Summary, in outline

• If you accidentally write a morbidly obese email, cut the fat before sending.
• Rapidly outline emails that involve combinations of numbers, important information, thoughts, and questions.
• By writing email more efficiently, you can repurpose your time to more productive or enjoyable endeavors.
• By sending emails that are more likely to be read, you become a more effective communicator.
• Your coworkers may learn by example and return the favor.
• Remember: People read email for information, not pleasure. Outlines are good at communicating information.

Ironically and by poor example, I have more to say on long emails, but this post is already plenty long enough, so I’ll do that down the road in this series.

How do you keep your emails lean?

Email

I always enjoy meeting PE readers through email, no matter the reasons they write.

Yeah, that just happened. I said I like getting email. I’m not someone that wants you to think I’m too important to respond to your emails. I’m just crazy like that.

Whether you want to tell me I’m way wrong, way right, or just say hi, I don’t care. Feedback is vital for improvement, and improvement is something I’m kinda fond of.

It’s especially fun when folks send me links to their own great work. That’s how I find out about really cool things that I can share with others. Like what? Well, like Christian Tietze’s version of Notational Velocity and Yuvi Zalkow’s great video on writing tools.

If these guys hadn’t emailed me, I might not have found their work. And I definitely wouldn’t have had the opportunity to swap ideas with them.

Even if it's not your own work, if you have something you think I would enjoy, send it to me.

Guest blogging

To date, I haven’t had any guests write for PE. I’d like to change that. If you want to write something that you think fits in with the theme here at PE (whatever the hell that is), let me know. I’ll even help you edit it if you want.

If you want to contribute, let me know.

Christian Tietze continues to refine Notational Velocity. He’s now added one of my most coveted features, the ability to save a MultiMarkdown note as HTML with the simple click of a button. It works great.

• Read more about Christian’s latest update
• Download the latest beta

Hopefully you haven’t noticed that PE has sorta been on autopilot for the last two weeks. I’ve been immersed in several projects, one of which just culminated in a trip to New York City to speak at an annual event that my professional organization, the Society of Actuaries, holds annually. That’s right; I’m an actuary by day. Bear with me.

I won’t bore you with the details of my day job or my recent presentation, which is mostly not relevant to PE. Instead, I thought you might be interested in the tools I used on my trip, or more importantly, how I used them.  Maybe it'll help you the next time you hit the road or hop through the clouds.

The iPad

This was the first time I’ve ever attended a conference and not printed anything. I didn’t even carry a pen with me. Not once was it a problem. It felt great walking around with only the iPad under my arm. No fumbling with piles of paper or bulky ring binders. Even better, I didn’t have to worry about getting my paper notes back home for future reference.

There were three iPad apps that I found particularly useful.

iThoughtsHD was my main note-taking app. Mind maps really are a perfect way to take notes when you have no clue where your notes are going but they all revolve around a central concept. In this case, I used a fairly simple mind map to keep up with things like session notes, people that I met, and other random thoughts-turned-text.

The iOS Calendar app made it easy to keep up with sessions and other important events.

I used GoodReader to keep my PDF handouts organized. GoodReader also came in handy while I was giving my presentation. While I usually avoid reading off of “cue cards,” there are certain things like panelist introductions that I want to make sure I get absolutely right. I created a few PDFs of my notes for quick reference in GoodReader. Worked great.

I probably sold a few iPads for Apple over the course of the week. Several people approached me and asked how I liked the iPad as a paper substitute. When I showed them how well GoodReader worked and its annotation abilities, I think they were sold.

The MacBook Pro

I love the portability and “instant-on-ness” of my iPad, but I still think my MacBook Pro is critical for any work involving lots of typing – or for working on things like presentations that are still pretty much “read only” on the iPad (as far as I’m concerned).

One of my favorite aspects of Mac OS is not how well it works but how well it sleeps. I can close the lid anytime and have confidence that my work will be right where I left it – ideal for traveling situations where you typically only get small bursts of time in front of your screen. The ten hour battery life is also huge while traveling.

The MiFi

I reviewed the Virgin Mobile MiFi earlier this year. I’m still a fan.

Virgin Mobile currently offers an unlimited data plan for only $40. Folks, if you travel at all, this is a no-brainer. The conference room Wi-Fi at my hotel was an absurd $100 per day. The Wi-Fi in the rooms was $15 per day.

For some reason in the US, the more expensive the hotel, the more á la carte and expensive the internet connectivity. For a one-time, contract-free cost of $40, you can avoid that whole racket and work on a secure network to boot.

iPad + MacBook Pro + MiFi + Dropbox = the everywhere tool set

Together, these four tools gave me everything I needed. I was able to work on the MacBook Pro, get online using the MiFi, and Dropbox was my file system in the sky.

Though my devices weren’t physically connected, they were seamlessly bound by Dropbox. I find it very empowering that I can choose any hardware I want on a whim and know that my data will just be there. Dropbox is truly magical, and I can't recommend it enough.

So what about you?

Tell me about how you get things done on the road or in the air.

Has the iPad changed your mobile workflows?

If you’d like to see a video presentation of some of the writing tools I discuss here at PE, I have some great news. Yuvi Zalkow created a excellent video that covers distraction-free writing tools like TextExpander, Notational Velocity, and many more. I really enjoyed Yuvi’s video and presentation style.

Even if you don’t consider yourself a “writer” or “novelist,” I highly recommend that you think about the concepts in Yuvi’s video.  They're useful for anyone that builds things from text. In other words, anyone that bangs on a keyboard.

I’d particularly like for you to question the utility of bulky word processors like MS Word in your workflow. Word can really be a productivity killer by inviting you to “publish as you write.”

Write, arrange, then publish. Use the right tool for the job at each step. I guarantee that you'll see a better product pop out at the end.

Evolving email is a series about putting yourself in the inbox of the recipient and getting more value out of the time you spend on the task of writing email.

* * *

Though I’m not sure of the precise history, at some point in the 1990s, popular email clients like Microsoft Outlook and its crippled sibling Outlook Express began to make use of rich text as the default for email composition.

Among the various and questionable benefits of rich text was the ability to use colored fonts. And soon after this ability was gained, the powers that be decided that email replies should happen in color by default. Namely, blue.

No, the “RE:” in the subject line wasn’t enough. Nor could the recipient of a reply be trusted to remember that they first sent the message. It was decided that replies must happen in color so that the recipient of a reply could be absolutely sure that they were reading a response to their own message.

The blue reply has probably saved millions of people from themselves by avoiding unnecessary confusion.

Of course, I joke.

It’s very likely that few in Outlook’s vast user base have ever questioned the utility of blue replies. Like so many other defaults bestowed by Microsoft, the blue reply became an unspoken common law.

That’s not to say there haven’t been deviants.

Some people have taken the concept of colored replies to more perverse heights. Instead of always replying in blue, they take advantage of an Outlook setting that sends each new reply in a different color. And no color, no matter how illegible, is off limits.

I remember a time when I emailed with a prominent exective who was doing this. When the messages started arriving in pastel shades of pink and purple (on a white background), I had to copy the text out of the email into a text file just to make it legible.

Like so many things in your technological life, just because you can doesn’t mean you should.

There is absolutely no utility in colored email replies. None. Not even blue ones.

Sorry if that makes me a colorless curmudgeon.

But think about it. Think about your recipient. No matter how neat and cute you think colored emails fonts are, the person reading them probably does not. They don’t care that today is Fuschia Friday. Would you?

The person that has to read your reply only cares about one thing: what you have to say. The easier you make your reply to read, the easier you’re making life for the person that sought your reply.

There is a reason that most web pages, novels, text books, pamphlets, and other media make use of a black font on a white background. It’s actually remarkably simple. It works. People can read it.

Black is more readable than any other hue on white – even blue believe it or not.

So I have a simple suggestion. Turn off colored fonts in your email client. Simply reply in a standard black font (some flavor of sans serif is ideal). Though you may feel like a radical at first, you’ll get used to seeing black on white when responding.

And trust me; no one will be confused.

I like bananas. Some would say that I am bananas. They would be right a lot of the time. But anyway… I don’t remember exactly when, but sometime last year, I stumbled across the following video, which shows how to peel a banana like a monkey:

[youtube nBJV56WUDng]

I immediately realized I had been wrecking the stem end of bananas my entire life. I might as well have been a caveman trying to smash the damn thing with a rock.

More importantly, I’d unknowingly made this avoidable blunder maybe a thousand times or more, and I never once stopped to question it.

But since watching that video, I’ve peeled every single one of them the “right” way. I evolved. It feels good to catch up with the other members of my biological order. Now if only I had a prehensile tail…

Practically efficient lessons and other monkey business

• Opportunity exists in every little regularly occurring frustration in your life.

• Many problems you have today were solved eons ago.

• The web (version 2.0) makes it easier to find wheels that have already been invented.

• Explore: question, search.

• Get better: learn, improve.

• Contribute: solve, illustrate, teach.

What unfortunate truths of your old universe have you debunked to become a higher-functioning primate?

Watch a real monkey eat a banana.

I have an unnaturally voracious interest in the social web and the technological innovation that’s driving it.  I could probably talk about it for hours. (I won't.) Also, as I state on my About page, I like people, things, and mixtures of people and things that work.

So it’s not surprising that I really enjoyed watching John Gruber’s recent presentation “Apple and the Open Web,” which was given at the 2010 Web 2.0 Expo. It was pretty much a big ole grab bag of all these interests in one 10-minute spot.

Not only that, it was a great lesson in how to give an effective presentation.

[youtube Qss5RnD7wK8]

My ideas, Gruber’s ideas, everybody’s ideas

My own definition of Web 2.0 uses an analogy with compact discs.

Web 1.0 was the read-only version of the web (CD-ROM); Web 2.0 is the read-write version (CD-RW). In Web 1.0, the majority consumed the content of minorities (think buying, listening to CDs); In Web 2.0, the masses are creators and distributors of content (think CD burners).

After watching Gruber, I began to see another dimension to Web 2.0.

On the surface, it appears that we interact with Web 2.0 in the same medium through which we watched Web 1.0: the web browser. But as Gruber makes clear, the web browser is just one vantage point. Mobile apps are a very real, if sneaky, Web 2.0 alternative to the web browser.

If you think about it, apps are really just a bunch of little niche-specific windows to the web. As Gruber points out, most great iPhone apps use and rely the web (to read and write). Apps are just the front-end paint users see when talking to the cloud.

Moreover, mobile apps and the web are mutually beneficial phenomena.

By introducing the world to the notion of mobile apps, Apple has given us screen after screen of highly dynamic lenses through which to read and write the web.

The web is like an undercurrent of social energy that flows through and powers mobile apps. It’s every bit as important as the battery current that illuminates app icons on the touch screen.

On to my more practical observations…

Three things I liked about about Gruber’s delivery

• The slides are an accessory to the speaker; he isn’t an accessory to the slides. So often speakers lean on their slides as a crutch. In many cases, PowerPoint slides become crowded cue cards. Gruber’s slides are clean and easy on the eyes. They're like a light but effective seasoning on the meat of the presentation.

• He’s calm. He doesn’t mind pausing to think. Pausing to collect and choose your words is FAR better than nervously rambling at the speed of thought.

• He did is homework. He’s very confident and knowledgeable about the topic. It shows.

If you follow PE for little Notational Velocity info gumdrops, I have another for you. Elastic Threads recently posted yet another new fork of Notational Velocity. This one has a fullscreen mode, menubar app, and more. Have a look.

Evolving email is a series about putting yourself in the inbox of the recipient and getting more value out of the time you spend on the task of writing email.

* * *

It’s completely fine to send someone a link to a web page that you think they’ll like. My friends do it. My family does it. I do it.

I've been really pleased with the response I've received to my call for folks interested in working on Notational Velocity. In particular, Christian Tietze, is really doing a great job with his Notational Velocity development.  Please support him by downloading his latest version and giving him feedback using the details he provided on his site.  You can also leave Christian feedback here at PE in the comments section or drop your own ideas for Notational Velocity features.

I've been personally testing Christian's versions of Notational Velocity, and they are coming along nicely. His latest build supports MultiMarkdown, and he's added a "heads-up display" (HUD), which is a preview window of the HTML (like QuickLook on your Mac).

Great work, Christian!