Year: 2015

This is why we can’t have nice things.

“Since we started to roll out unlimited cloud storage to Office 365 consumer subscribers, a small number of users backed up numerous PCs and stored entire movie collections and DVR recordings. In some instances, this exceeded 75 TB per user or 14,000 times the average,” read the blog post, attributed to the OneDrive Team. “Instead of focusing on extreme backup scenarios, we want to remain focused on delivering high-value productivity and collaboration experiences that benefit the majority of OneDrive users.”

Source: Microsoft Kills Unlimited OneDrive Storage, Downgrades Paid and Free Options – Digits – WSJ

I’m not a OneDrive user, but I have made statements just like this as a middle school science teacher…and seriously, did Microsoft not see this coming?

Yes, your brain (and mine) needs more downtime

“Downtime is an opportunity for the brain to make sense of what it has recently learned, to surface fundamental unresolved tensions in our lives and to swivel its powers of reflection away from the external world toward itself. While mind-wandering we replay conversations we had earlier that day, rewriting our verbal blunders as a way of learning to avoid them in the future.”

Source: Why Your Brain Needs More Downtime

Episode 10: Thinking Out Loud 88: Toughening Up – Thinking.FM

nanowrimo

Elisabeth and Merianna follow up their conversation from last week about the importance of protecting your content. Then, they recount their experiences at recent conferences and how they are learning that they need to be tougher with the authors they work with in order to help authors put their best work into the world. They also talk about upcoming NanoWrimo and their plans to write, write, write!

Show Notes

What are Elisabeth and Merianna reading?



The post Thinking Out Loud 88: Toughening Up appeared first on Thinking.FM.

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Bigger Fixes Nothing in Churches

“CHURCH: Stop preaching downloaded sermons from other preachers. If you found it online, so can the congregation. People want to hear your take on God’s Word, not a re-heated sermon from someone else.”

Source: Bigger Fixes Nothing (7 Unexpected Steps Toward Church Health) | Pivot | A Blog by Karl Vaters

Saving these for later… and for clients.

So true.

Goodbye, Oyster.

“Looking forward, we feel this is best seized by taking on new opportunities to fully realize our vision for ebooks. With that, we will be taking steps to sunset the existing Oyster service over the next several months. If you are an Oyster reader you will receive an email personally regarding your account.”

Source: oysterbooks

Hmm… never a good post to make on a Friday night before Halloween… I wonder if it was poor uptake, Amazon Kindle Unlimited, or just market economics of the ebook subscription model?

This is the perfect opening to a scifi novel…

“With the help of James Jubilee, a former American arms control officer and now a senior science and technology coordinator for health issues in Kazakhstan, Dr. LaPorte tracked down Mr. Dey through the State Department, and his images and documentation quickly convinced them of the earthworks’ authenticity and importance.”

Source: NASA Adds to Evidence of Mysterious Ancient Earthworks

Get to writing, someone. I want to read this book and how humanity is shaken to its roots by startling revelations about our species’ history…

Charity has changed (listen up, churches).

“One thing is clear: Giving has changed, says JoAnn Turnquist, president and CEO of the Central Carolina Community Foundation. “People want to feel ownership of how their dollars are being used,” Turnquist says. Previous generations, Turnquist says, “were brought up to give to institutions, organizations that had secured the community’s trust,” she says. “The donors trusted that their dollars would be used appropriately.” “Move forward to 20- and 30-somethings that are tech savvy, get their information differently, from peers and online — they are motivated more by peer influencers,” Turnquist says.”

Source: Flood Shows How Charity Has Changed – Free-Times.com

And churches wonder why “giving” is down among members and supporters? It’s because churches aren’t keeping up with the “how” part of stewardship and giving and being inflexible.

“Turn off that phone and do some real work.”

“In our constantly developing world, we have to learn to adapt to change. The fact that we are so dependent on the internet is scary. But the fact that you, as an adult, are struggling to keep up with us and the internet, does not give you the right to say that the way we are learning and growing up and socialising is wrong and we need to go back to how you used to write letters to your friends or call them using the home telephone. Neither way of living and socialising is better, just very different, which I think is the main cause of the older generation not tolerating the use of our phones.”

Source: Dear old people: why should I turn off my phone?

Anecdotally, I’ve always found that it’s the people / teachers / ministers etc who complain the most about “young kids always being on their phones” that leave their phones’ ringers on (at full volume) and have no problem answering a call (after a few rings, of course) and having a very loud conversation despite the context or their situation.

Google Bringing Podcasting to Android and Play Music

“But Google isn’t just trying to create more Serial fanatics on Android. No, it wants to reach people that have never listened to podcasts. And it wants to broaden its media offerings in the fight with Apple, the frequent go-to platform for media producers.”

Source: Google Brings Podcasting to Play Music Streaming Service, Android | Re/code

I’m excited to see podcasting continue to expand into the “mainstream” of public consumption. Hopefully, NPR doesn’t suck all the air out of the room.

If you’re a business, group, church, school etc… you need to be podcasting. Get in touch if you need help (we’ve set up and continue to manage many podcasts for clients).

And support indie podcasters for a healthy podcasting ecosystem… like the fine folks at Thinking.FM.