Kicking the Addiction to Multitasking - AJ Jacobs: My colossal task burden - The Guaridan

AJ Jacobs: My colossal task burden | Life and style | The Guardian

When AJ Jacobs learned multitasking was bad for you, he decided to kick his chronic addiction to mental juggling. Get ready for Operation Focus…

‘This is awful. I feel as if my brain has entered a school zone and has to slow down to 25mph.’ Photograph: Christopher Lane

The stereo is silent. The TV black. The room dark. I am focused on nothing but a glowing computer screen. I’m doing this because I have a problem focusing. My brain is all over the place. Unless I’m doing at least two things at once, I feel like I’m wasting my time. Phone and email. Watching TV, checking Facebook and reading the news online. Texting and peeing.

In one sense, task-juggling makes me feel great: busy, energised, fulfilled, as if I’m living three lives in the space of one. But I also know I’m scattered. I’m overloading my circuits. This overstimulated, underfocused world is driving us all batty. My mother – who complains when I click through my emails while talking to her on the phone (and by talking, I mean I toss out an occasional “uh-huh” or “sounds good”) – recently sent me an article about how multitasking is actually inefficient.

Hence Operation Focus. I’m going to recapture my attention span. I pledge to go cold turkey from multitasking for a month. Only single tasks. Uni-tasking. And, just as important, I’ll stick with each task for more than my average 30 seconds. I’ll be the most focused man in the world.

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iTaskinator - iPhone Task Manager for Muslims

iTaskinator - iPhone Task Manager for Muslims

iTaskinator schedules your tasks through an easy to use interface. It utilizes a proven time-management technique called “Time-blocking” 

to help you focus on getting important things done. What’s more, it automatically schedules around your local prayer times, so that you don’t miss any prayers!

How to sell your books in the iBook store - TUAW

Calling all authors: How to sell your books in the iBook store

…Have you got a novel or two in your bottom desk drawer? Did you participate in the National Novel Writing Month competition last November? Are you a budding author who needs that last nudge to actually get writing? If any of these describe you, Apple has just given you a way to get your masterpiece into the iBooks store for the iPad, and you can do it yourself. You don’t need a publisher, distributor, agent or anything else for that matter. You can decide how much to charge and which countries (that have an iBook store) to sell into. You also get the same deal as the app publishers, meaning that Apple takes 30% and you keep 70% of the revenue.
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Technology in the recession | Less is Moore | The Economist

There is strong demand for technologies that do the same for less money, rather than more for the same price

FOR years, the computer industry has made steady progress by following Moore’s law, derived from an observation made in 1965 by Gordon Moore, a co-founder of Intel, now the world’s biggest chipmaker. His original formulation was rather technical, and was based on the number of transistors that could be crammed onto a chip, but it was adopted as a road map by the industry, so that it became a self-fulfilling prophecy. In practice, it boils down to the following: the cost of a given amount of computing power falls by half roughly every 18 months; so the amount of computing power available at a particular price doubles over the same period.

This has resulted in a geometric increase in the processing power of desktop computers, laptops, mobile phones, and so forth. Constant improvements mean that more features can be added to these products each year without increasing the price. A desire to do ever more elaborate things with computers—in particular, to supply and consume growing volumes of information over the internet—kept people and companies upgrading. Each time they bought a new machine, it cost around the same as the previous one, but did a lot more. But now things are changing, partly because the industry is maturing, and partly because of the recession. Suddenly there is much more interest in products that apply the flip side of Moore’s law: instead of providing ever-increasing performance at a particular price, they provide a particular level of performance at an ever-lower price.

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Productive Talk Compilation: 8-episode podcast with GTD’s David Allen | 43 Folders

As MP3 file; or grab this tastier m4a version, which includes chapter markers that make it easy to flip through the individual episodes quickly.

Productive Talk Compilation: 8-episode podcast with GTD’s David Allen | 43 Folders

MindNode » MindNode Pro - Mindmapping for the Mac (free - and inexpensive Pro version)

MindNode Pro is an elegant and simple-to-use mindmapping application for the Macintosh. It was created with the user in mind and features a very simple and intuitive user interface that lets the user focus on expressing and developing ideas. Nearly no time is required to learn the interface.

MindNode Pro 1.0.3
(Buy Now)

MindNode 1.2
(Freeware)

Lifehacker: Best Of Tech 2008: Most Popular Top 10’s of 2008

20 of the most popular Top 10’s that have published in 2008 so far….

1. Top 10 Obscure Google Search Tricks
   “Dozens
   of Google search guides detail the tips you already know, but today
   we’re skipping the obvious and highlighting our favorite obscure Google
   web search tricks.”
   
2. Top 10 Ways to Stay Energized
   “You
   can overcome a late night of net surfing, a rough morning, or just the
   post-lunch stupor without becoming an over-wired mess.” 
   
3. Top 10 Firefox 3 Features
   “The
   newest version of our favorite open source web browser, Mozilla Firefox
   3, offers dozens of new features and fixes, but only a handful will
   make the most dramatic difference in your everyday browsing.”
4. Top 10 How To Videos
   “Your
   crafty older relatives used to have to mail-order their video tutorials
   or wait for “This Old House” reruns to get their DIY on, but the age of
   streaming video has been good to those who like to tinker and try out
   neat tricks.”
5. Top 10 Things You Forgot Your Mac Can Do
   “From
   pure eye candy to outright productivity-boosters, read on to get
   reminded of some of the more obscure things you can do with your Mac,
   fresh out of the box.”
   
6. Top 10 Computer Annoyances and How to Fix Them
   “Computers
   are supposed to make our lives easier, but too much of the time they
   can be frustrating, time-wasting, stubborn machines.”
7. Top 10 Ways to Get Cables Under Control
   “When
   you finally decide it’s time to do something about that rat’s nest of
   cables that’s spreading like kudzu, you don’t have to spend a lot of
   time and money to get it under control.”
8. Top 10 Modern Life Survival Skills
   “Avoid
   everyday problems and modern mini-calamities by arming yourself with
   the right know-how before you head out into the world.”
9. Top 10 Ways to Trick Out Your Desktop
   “For
   something that you look at every day of your working life, your
   computer desktop doesn’t get as much attention as it deserves.”
10. Top 10 Conversation Hacks
    “A
    whole lot more than just words passes between people who are talking,
    so a few simple conversational skills can help you recognize what’s
    really being said and help you lead the discussion your way.”
    
11. Top 10 Office Supply Hacks
    “Given
    some spare time and a few neglected items in the office supply closet,
    anyone can make their workspace more functional, create a cool tools
    for their home and office, and even rescue seemingly ruined stuff.”
12. Top 10 Easy Ways to Look Sharp
    “In
    a perfect world, it wouldn’t matter what a genius JavaScript programmer
    or top-flight professional looked like. In this world, though, coming
    across as an unkempt schlub won’t do anything good for your career,
    your social life, or your luck with that cute guy or gal from
    marketing.”
13. Top 10 Apps Worth Installing Adobe AIR For
    “While
    many of them are simply desktop translations of web interfaces that
    were easy to use already, a handful of AIR apps truly make work and
    play easier, or just more interesting.”
14. Top 10 Underhyped Webapps
    “Even
    in this golden age of Big Internet Companies Acquiring Everything In
    Sight, there are still a few independent, small webapps out there that
    don’t get the attention they should for their useful functionality.”
    

The new Mac buying guide | Macworld

“Which Mac should you buy? Here’s our expert advice.”

Review: Google Mobile App, revisited | iPhone Central | Macworld

Review: Google Mobile App, revisited | iPhone Central | Macworld: “The first version of Google Mobile App () was strong on searches, but weak when it came to Google’s peripheral applications. Not that Google’s search supremacy was ever in doubt, but with the recent introduction of voice search, the updated Google Mobile App is a quantum leap beyond its predecessor. The secondary Google products are still poorly implemented here, but you will be too absorbed with the voice search too care.”

Effective Time Use and Getting Things Done: Video of Merlin Mann at Google

Weekend Watching: Merlin Mann on Maximizing Your Time

Google asked productivity blogger Merlin Mann to visit their campus and share some insights into getting things done. His presentation covers several interesting aspects of time management and productivity including renegotiating your commitments, controlling who has access to your limited resources like time and output, and qualifying how your commit yourself to tasks to create a more sane work environment. The video is thirty five minutes and worth the watch for a solid set of productivity principles to help you start this coming week on the right foot.

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