The old days

It was on these forums that the experts hung out. I was always amazed over the amount of answers I got there and one day I wanted to be a person who gave answers as well. I always tried to see if there was some small question that I could maybe help out with but usually I hardly understood the problem good enough to even give a hint to a possible solution.
Times changed. I went to school to become a pro in the area and when activity got low I stopped hanging out on the forums. Instead I started to go to friends or colleagues for feedback.

A new place for the cool people

A couple of months back I heard of something called Forrst. My rss-feeds were buzzing about it and appearantly it seemed to be a very cool place to hang out on for developers and designers. That is if you were cool as well. It was invitation only. I filled out the application form but thought that since I’m not Chris Coyier on CSS-tricks or Ryan Carson from Carsonified my chances were zero. I was simply not cool enough. Dang it!
I gave up. No invite was coming. Then I started to follow the buzz on Twitter. Turns out people were having invites to give away to us less fortunate. (I still thought it was all about coolness…) I started to answering these people and after a while I got the following tweet:
“@kolombiken I like your portfolio, send me your email address and I’ll give you an invite.”
Do I need to tell you I was happy?

You should apply

Forrst was, is, exactly as I imagined it to be and more. So many talented and passionate people all in one place. You are able to upload snaps of your design or code. Ask questions, share links and the best part: get lots of feedback! It was just like in the old days on my forums but with a much better interface.
So let me just tell you this: If you are a designer or developer or both and you have a true passion for the web. Forrst’s the place to be! Fill out their application form today.

Uhm yea, right, sending in applications doesn’t work? Well, turns out I was wrong on that one. Some weeks after I was invited I got an email in my inbox. It was an official invite to join Forrst.

/Ida

Ps. For you Forrsters I’m kolombiken.

So this is my recommendation if you want a book to read this summer! And yes, there’s a ’second edition’ of the book and that’s the one you should go for.

Have a really nice summer everyone!

Best regards,
Simon

“The clarity, even genius, of REWORK actually brought me to near-tears on several occasions.”
-Tom Peters, New York Times bestselling author of IN SEARCH OF EXCELLENCE

The only reason my tears were pouring was because i was allergic to the inc (honestly!). But then again, the book wasn’t really written for my target audience (i still think that Tom Peters guy is a softy though). Rework is, just as i like it, a quick read. Those 280 pages has a lot of white space and art work and an average chapter is about 1.5 pages.

If you are a reader of 37Signals blog ”Signal vs Noise” or have heard any of Jasons talks, then you’re probably familiar with the concepts presented in this book. And even if you are familiar with Jasons and Davids concepts I still think Rework is a good buy. It’s nice to have their thoughts distilled down and gathered in one place.

So, are their ideas that radical? No! Not at all. Most of them are in my opinion pretty obvious. But do companies really work in this way? Do they encourage their employees not to work overtime? Do they trust their employees enough that they can make independent dessisions? Do they recommend their competitors if they feel their products is not a perfect fit for the customer? I think most of them probably don’t. And if you work on a place like that, you should plant this book on his desk or bathroom. Or maybe if you work on a place where your boss micro manage every move you make and have his own bathroom you should get out of there and start something on your own.

If you are an entrepreneur, or a “starter” as Jason like to call it, then this book is a must. But remember to, as I’ve said before, read it with your critical eye. It’s easy to just swallow everything as absolute truths. Especially when they write in such confidence. As they themselves put it “get inspired, don’t copy!”

Boagworld

Boagworld consists of the hosts Paul Boag and Marcus Lillington. They discuss web news and other web related topics and have interviews with interesting people. The topics are never discussed to deep and are more on the design/management side then on the tech side. Paul is a great storyteller and it’s always fun to hear Marcus interupting and disagreeing with Paul all the time.

Think Vitamin Radio

Think vitamin is a great blog from Carsonified so when I heard that they now have a podcast, Think Vitamin Radio, I got really excited. I have only listened to the three first episodes so far but I have really enjoyed them. They are a bit stiff and the sound is not top notch but I’m sure they’ll get the hang of it soon. Some of the topics discussed are web design, standards, accessibility, AB testing and events related to web development.

The Pipeline

This podcast came from nowhere for me. I had never heard of Dan Benjamin before (yes, shame on me). Dan is an experinced podcaster and that shows. In every episode Dan interviews a new person and the interviews are really interesting.
Most of the guests are from the web design/development/entrepreneurship world. For example people like Ryan Carson (from Carsonified), Jason Fried (from 37 signals) and Jeffrey Zeldman (from uhm… wherever gods hang out).

For the Swedish people there is a podcast called Webbradion that airs every two weeks. They talk both local and international web stuff and do some interviews. What podcasts fuel your inspiration?

// Johan

My first impression of his new book “Crush it!” was not very imposing. It was thin, the pages where ruff and the cover was kinda shrill, felt like the kind of book you buy from “life coach”-ranters.

The opening sounds like sales talk from TV-shop and got me really put off. At that point I was really disappointed and sceptic about the whole thing. I saw a comment somewhere saying that “the book was dictated and that shows” while the first part is very true the latter I do not agree with at all. As you continue reading the salesy tonality dims down and you can almost hear his creaky voice through the pages.

For a 15 year old the obvious way to make you’re self heard is through what “old people” call social media. They don’t care what banners say, they care what their peers say. Media agencies seem to ignore that fact and continue to pump out flash banners untargeted and in every direction they can. What they need to realize is that that market is dying as the “young generation” turn in to a more mature one. Even if this book is not intended to be a “social marketing guide” this is exactly what it is and a lot more. Gary is not one of those self proclaimed Social Media gurus. Ok, maybe he is, but he knows what he is talking about and makes some very good points even though his honesty and straightforwardness can come across a little harsh and salesy. This takes a little while to get used to.

The book is stuffed with exemples on how to turn your interest and passion into your living. Many of them real life exemples and some very fictional but the bottom line is that, as Gary would’ve put it:
“There is no reason in this day and age to do shit you hate. You can lose as much money being happy as hell.”

He talks a lot about honesty and transparency on which I agree very much but there are also parts I don’t agree on. For example, he says “do what you’re DNA say you’re good at”, in my opinion you need to do stuff you’re not good at in order to figure out what you are good at.

All in all I think this was a very good book with a little bit of a wake up punch in it. Read it with a bit of scepticism (as you should with everything!) and take only what you felt was good from it.

Gary really understands that dialogue is > than monologue even though he is a master of both. When I tweeted out I was reading the book I got an enthusiastic “yes!!!!” back from him.

// Johan