Filed Under: Blogging, Thinking Out Loud with 1 Comment
Defining ‘blogging’ is like explaining ‘God’ (without the likelihood of ensuing bloodshed) - every blogger and non-blogger has their own idea of what ‘blogging’ is (and every believer, non-believer and fence-rider has their own idea of what ‘God’ is), and they’re all wrong about both.
When you can’t agree on what something is, it’s time to agree on what something isn’t. Here I sense that we will agree - God is not man (and therefore should not be anthropomorphised with human attributes) and blogging is NOT writing.
Filed Under: Work with 4 Comments
Ever since I started working online, I’ve had trouble answering a very simple question - what do you do?
In university it was easy - you could tell them you were studying computer science and while you never wanted to write code again in your life, people would have no problems in attaching a convenient label to you (computers in this case).
But after university, things got complicated. Saying ‘I write for a living’ was exotic but invariably followed by the question ‘but what is your real job?’ or ‘when are you going to get a real job’. Apparently earning twice as much as my fellow graduates while working half as much was considered cheating and without a future. Maybe it was, but what did I know?
Filed Under: Pakistan with 0 Comments
Thursday, 9 October 2008.
Another bomb went off in Islamabad today, this time hitting the Anti-Terrorism Wing in the Police Headquarters. Where was everyone? The other end of the city, providing security for a 2-day briefing session on Anti-Terrorism.
It would be a laughing matter if a bomb going off in Pakistan wasn’t such a common affair. Common enough that when the bomb went off this morning one of the primary sticking points wasn’t ‘who did it’ or why did this happen’, it was the size of the crater produced from the blast.
I was in a building roughly 500 meters away from the blast when it happened - but once we knew we were safe (windows shattered but the building was still standing) we peeked outside the window to see the smoke and in less than 2 minutes, we were back to work.
We’re not scared anymore.
Filed Under: Thinking Out Loud with 0 Comments
From another book I was browsing through today:
Filed Under: Thinking Out Loud with 0 Comments
From a book I’m reading:
Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows that it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed.
Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows that it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve.
It doesn’t matter whether you’re a lion or a gazelle; when the sun comes up, you had better start running.
Filed Under: Thinking Out Loud with 0 Comments
Mohammed Bello is 84 years old. He’s a maulvi. He has 86 wives, 170 children and lives in Bida, Nigeria.
Apparently his neighbours are a little upset with his lifestyle. They’ve painted it as a religious issue but surely the sociological and psychological aspects are far more fascinating? Anyone?
Filed Under: Branding with 2 Comments
You’re either boring or you stand out. You’re either invisible or remarkable. And, all your life, everyone has been pushing you to fit in. All your life you’re told to keep your head down, work hard, don’t make waves and get it done. What rubbish. Here, in 10 easy steps, is how to grow. How to stand out. How to get noticed, make a difference and have a shot at the big time.
Filed Under: Thinking Out Loud with 0 Comments
It really is…
The ignorance we’re familiar with is the kind where YOU not knowing something allows you to be happier than if you had that knowledge. It holds true in a variety of cases, like how you’re happier the second before you’re told your parents left everything to your sister and nothing for you in their will.
I’m not one to argue for lack of information but wouldn’t you be happier if you didn’t know your mother was a whore? If that last sentence angers you, I’m sorry to have been the one to tell you. if it made you laugh, congratulations, you have no shame.
But there’s a second type of ignorance which keeps people happy, the kind where you deliberately keep OTHERS in the dark to ensure that they don’t want to kill you (anymore than they already do). You stay alive, they’re unaware of what they should be doing to you and everyone’s better off (i.e. you’re better off).
Filed Under: Thinking Out Loud with 0 Comments
Exponential growth is a simple and powerful idea. A good way to learn about it is to watch this series of videos.
Filed Under: Branding, Promotion with 0 Comments
When a product is used by the ‘most popular stars’ / ‘most popular websites’ etc, what does that tell you?
That it’s good?
Or that their marketing team did a great job of snagging the most popular people?
From another book I was browsing through today:
From a book I’m reading:
Every morning in Africa, a gazelle wakes up. It knows that it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed.
Every morning in Africa, a lion wakes up. It knows that it must run faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve.
It doesn’t matter whether you’re a [...]
Mohammed Bello is 84 years old. He’s a maulvi. He has 86 wives, 170 children and lives in Bida, Nigeria.
Apparently his neighbours are a little upset with his lifestyle. They’ve painted it as a religious issue but surely the sociological and psychological aspects are far more fascinating? Anyone?