Moving On…

Fair warning. I’m blowing up my blog. Or as I said on Twitter, I’m about to Little House my blog.

It will return soon in a new form. But for now, I’m blowing it up.

If you subscribe to the RSS feed and enjoyed what I wrote about technology, productivity, pop culture and general nerdery/geekery then just stay subscribed. It’ll come back to life soon enough.

If you subscribe and are interested in my old political writings, then I’ll point you to my firm’s blog at http://www.bluedotgroup.com. While it’s been dormant as of late, it will return to life soon as well.

Thanks to those who hung around even as I’ve allowed this little corner of the Internet to wither and nearly die. Time to spruce it up and start afresh.

Obama's Arizona Speech →

Exceptional. Go watch it. You’ll be glad you did.

DuPree for Governor →

Over at my firm’s blog, I just announced our newest client.

Hattiesburg Mayor Johnny DuPree has an exceptional record as a small business owner, school board member, county supervisor and mayor. Hattiesburg is one of Mississippi’s greatest cities, and we believe that is in part because of the team Mayor DuPree has built there and the way he encourages people to work together to build stronger communities.

Jonathan Fields: J.K. Rowling on Failure And Imagination →

On this first Monday of the New Year, I thought how powerful it would be to share J.K. Rowling’s marvelous 2008 Harvard commencement speech on failure and imagination, two things she illuminates in a way that brings fresh life to their power and impact as we look ahead.

RIP, Pete Postlethwaite →

One of his best roles, in my opinion, was The Shipping News. Nothing spectacular, just wonderfully portrayed.

NYT: Secession Vote in Sudan May Be Peaceful →

Let’s hope this is the case.

The stakes are so high that neither side, the Islamist northern government or the former rebels who lead southern Sudan, seems to want to be sucked into a war again, or at least to start one. Over the past year, there has been such a steady drumbeat of Armageddon predictions that most potential problems have already been prepared for and Western diplomats have spent countless hours counseling both sides. The stage is now set for the vote to be historic and highly emotional, but not catastrophic.

Both sides, according to many analysts, are more pragmatic than they are often given credit for. Despite being portrayed as careless brutes in many Western countries, the Islamist cabal that controls Sudan, starting with Mr. Bashir, has shown surprising elasticity.

Brett Kelly: 2010 in Review, Goals for 2011 →

One of the more frank posts about goals for 2011, including this great little wrap-up:

Miscellaneous – Other goals for this year in no particular order: lose some weight, stop being so self-deprecating, delight the shit out of my kids as frequently as possible, give my saintly wife the tenth anniversary she so richly deserves, attend at least one conference and address a group of strangers at least once.

Patton Oswald: Wake Up, Geek Culture. Time to Die →

Absolutely fantastic. For all of you nerds, geeks or outliers, go read!

On Usernames and Sabbatical →

Adam King on why he uses the username Sabbatical:

I keep it to remind myself that I need to stop and breathe. The practice of sabbatical — of “sabbath”, pause, reflection, and rest — is vital to personal health, and I’m all too quick to abandon it, if I let myself. It’s a constant call to maintain balance.

NYT: Teacher Rankings, Once Internal, Are Now Questioned →

The wrong way to judge a teacher’s effectiveness:

The rankings are based on an algorithm that few other than statisticians can understand, and on tests that the state has said were too narrow and predictable. Most teachers’ scores fall somewhere in a wide range, with perfection statistically impossible. And the system has also suffered from the everyday problems inherent in managing busy urban schools, like the challenge of using old files and computer databases to ensure that the right teachers are matched to the right students.

The right way to judge a teacher’s effectiveness:

“If I thought they gave accurate information, I would take them more seriously,” the principal of P.S. 321, Elizabeth Phillips, said about the rankings. “But some of my best teachers have the absolute worst scores,” she said, adding that she had based her assessment of those teachers on “classroom observations, talking to the children and the number of parents begging me to put their kids in their classes.”