I just finished reading Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers book.

Amazon Best of the Month, November 2008: Now that he's gotten us talking about the viral life of ideas and the power of gut reactions, Malcolm Gladwell poses a more provocative question in Outliers: why do some people succeed, living remarkably productive and impactful lives, while so many more never reach their potential? Challenging our cherished belief of the "self-made man," he makes the democratic assertion that superstars don't arise out of nowhere, propelled by genius and talent: "they are invariably the beneficiaries of hidden advantages and extraordinary opportunities and cultural legacies that allow them to learn and work hard and make sense of the world in ways others cannot." Examining the lives of outliers from Mozart to Bill Gates, he builds a convincing case for how successful people rise on a tide of advantages, "some deserved, some not, some earned, some just plain lucky."
Outliers can be enjoyed for its bits of trivia, like why most pro hockey players were born in January, how many hours of practice it takes to master a skill, why the descendents of Jewish immigrant garment workers became the most powerful lawyers in New York, how a pilots' culture impacts their crash record, how a centuries-old culture of rice farming helps Asian kids master math. But there's more to it than that. Throughout all of these examples--and in more that delve into the social benefits of lighter skin color, and the reasons for school achievement gaps--Gladwell invites conversations about the complex ways privilege manifests in our culture. He leaves us pondering the gifts of our own history, and how the world could benefit if more of our kids were granted the opportunities to fulfill their remarkable potential. --Mari Malcolm

One of the interesting points is 10,000 hrs of practice are required to achieve a level of expertise.  An excerpt published in the Guardian is available.

This idea - that excellence at a complex task requires a critical, minimum level of practice - surfaces again and again in studies of expertise. In fact, researchers have settled on what they believe is a magic number for true expertise: 10,000 hours.

"In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice-skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals," writes the neurologist Daniel Levitin, "this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is equivalent to roughly three hours a day, or 20 hours a week, of practice over 10 years... No one has yet found a case in which true world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery."

For an exercise I tried to figure out what I had practiced for 10,000 hrs. And, what I came up with is being a technology evangelist.

A technical or technology evangelist is a person who attempts to build a critical mass of support for a given technology in order to establish it as a technical standard in a market that is subject to network effects.^{[citation needed]} Professional technology evangelists are often employed by firms which seek to establish their proprietary technologies as de facto standards or to participate in setting non-proprietary open standards. Non-professional technology evangelists may act out of altruism or self-interest (e.g., to gain the benefits of early adoption or the network effect).

Technical evangelists may act, officially or unofficially, on behalf of a company or organisation, or on a personal basis, for instance open source evangelism. An evangelist promotes the use of a particular product or technology through talks, articles, blogging, user demonstrations, recorded demonstrations, or the creation of sample projects. The word evangelism is taken from the context of religious evangelism because of the similar recruitment of converts and the spreading of the product information through the ideological or committed.

Being independent of an organization has allowed me to have more fun blogging on the Green Data Center topic, and working with whoever I want.  Working at companies like Apple and Microsoft I learned a lot, but being on my own is turning out to be like graduating from college, taking the path of altruism.

Blogging is part of my practice; researching and writing about technology and methods to create greener data centers. I have a long way to go to achieve 10,000 hrs on green data centers, but I am sure time will go by quickly.

Nicholas Carr has a blog post on blogging.

Surface tensions

October 15, 2008

In the new issue of the Atlantic, veteran blogger Andrew Sullivan writes a thoughtful and generous paean to blogging, which he calls - and he means it more as compliment than as criticism - "a superficial medium":

By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy. No one wants to read a 9,000-word treatise online. On the Web, one-sentence links are as legitimate as thousand-word diatribes—in fact, they are often valued more. And, as Matt Drudge told me when I sought advice from the master in 2001, the key to understanding a blog is to realize that it’s a broadcast, not a publication. If it stops moving, it dies. If it stops paddling, it sinks.

Nicholas references Andrew Sullivan’s “Why I Blog”

For centuries, writers have experimented with forms that evoke the imperfection of thought, the inconstancy of human affairs, and the chastening passage of time. But as blogging evolves as a literary form, it is generating a new and quintessentially postmodern idiom that’s enabling writers to express themselves in ways that have never been seen or understood before. Its truths are provisional, and its ethos collective and messy. Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

by Andrew Sullivan

Why I Blog

Andrew makes excellent points.

Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

Anyone who has blogged his thoughts for an extended time will recognize this world. We bloggers have scant opportunity to collect our thoughts, to wait until events have settled and a clear pattern emerges. We blog now—as news reaches us, as facts emerge.

The blog remained a superficial medium, of course. By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy.

But the superficiality masked considerable depth—greater depth, from one perspective, than the traditional media could offer. The reason was a single technological innovation: the hyperlink. An old-school columnist can write 800 brilliant words analyzing or commenting on, say, a new think-tank report or scientific survey. But in reading it on paper, you have to take the columnist’s presentation of the material on faith, or be convinced by a brief quotation (which can always be misleading out of context). Online, a hyperlink to the original source transforms the experience.

But blogging requires an embrace of such hazards, a willingness to fall off the trapeze rather than fail to make the leap.

Some of the points I most attached to are:

It renders a writer and a reader not just connected but linked in a visceral, personal way. The only term that really describes this is friendship. And it is a relatively new thing to write for thousands and thousands of friends.

A good blog is your own private Wikipedia.

And, then I realized differences I am trying to do with the Green Data Center blog.

A traditional writer is valued by readers precisely because they trust him to have thought long and hard about a subject, given it time to evolve in his head, and composed a piece of writing that is worth their time to read at length and to ponder. Bloggers don’t do this and cannot do this—and that limits them far more than it does traditional long-form writing.

The torrent of blogospheric insights, ideas, and arguments places a greater premium on the person who can finally make sense of it all, turning it into something more solid, and lasting, and rewarding.

The one big point Andrew missed for Why I Blog is the metrics. I know how many people view a post in RSS readers and click on links. I can see when search engines bring traffic and what companies are top in traffic. The problem with traditional publishing is it is open loop.  Adaptable efficient designs have closed loop control systems.  Publishing on a blog with tools like Feedburner, Google Analytics, Quantcast, and Typepad Stats allows me to get information on how well things work and what I need to change.

I blog because it is a closed loop publishing system. 

And, one of the top features I look for in a Green Data Center is whether the engineers and operators use control theory to build closed loop feedbacks.

How else do you know if things are working the way you expect?

Nicholas Carr has a blog post on blogging.

Surface tensions

October 15, 2008

In the new issue of the Atlantic, veteran blogger Andrew Sullivan writes a thoughtful and generous paean to blogging, which he calls - and he means it more as compliment than as criticism - "a superficial medium":

By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy. No one wants to read a 9,000-word treatise online. On the Web, one-sentence links are as legitimate as thousand-word diatribes—in fact, they are often valued more. And, as Matt Drudge told me when I sought advice from the master in 2001, the key to understanding a blog is to realize that it’s a broadcast, not a publication. If it stops moving, it dies. If it stops paddling, it sinks.

Nicholas references Andrew Sullivan’s “Why I Blog”

For centuries, writers have experimented with forms that evoke the imperfection of thought, the inconstancy of human affairs, and the chastening passage of time. But as blogging evolves as a literary form, it is generating a new and quintessentially postmodern idiom that’s enabling writers to express themselves in ways that have never been seen or understood before. Its truths are provisional, and its ethos collective and messy. Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

by Andrew Sullivan

Why I Blog

Andrew makes excellent points.

Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

Anyone who has blogged his thoughts for an extended time will recognize this world. We bloggers have scant opportunity to collect our thoughts, to wait until events have settled and a clear pattern emerges. We blog now—as news reaches us, as facts emerge.

The blog remained a superficial medium, of course. By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy.

But the superficiality masked considerable depth—greater depth, from one perspective, than the traditional media could offer. The reason was a single technological innovation: the hyperlink. An old-school columnist can write 800 brilliant words analyzing or commenting on, say, a new think-tank report or scientific survey. But in reading it on paper, you have to take the columnist’s presentation of the material on faith, or be convinced by a brief quotation (which can always be misleading out of context). Online, a hyperlink to the original source transforms the experience.

But blogging requires an embrace of such hazards, a willingness to fall off the trapeze rather than fail to make the leap.

Some of the points I most attached to are:

It renders a writer and a reader not just connected but linked in a visceral, personal way. The only term that really describes this is friendship. And it is a relatively new thing to write for thousands and thousands of friends.

A good blog is your own private Wikipedia.

And, then I realized differences I am trying to do with the Green Data Center blog.

A traditional writer is valued by readers precisely because they trust him to have thought long and hard about a subject, given it time to evolve in his head, and composed a piece of writing that is worth their time to read at length and to ponder. Bloggers don’t do this and cannot do this—and that limits them far more than it does traditional long-form writing.

The torrent of blogospheric insights, ideas, and arguments places a greater premium on the person who can finally make sense of it all, turning it into something more solid, and lasting, and rewarding.

The one big point Andrew missed for Why I Blog is the metrics. I know how many people view a post in RSS readers and click on links. I can see when search engines bring traffic. The problem with traditional publishing is it is open loop.  Adaptable efficient designs have closed loop control systems.  Publishing on a blog with tools like Feedburner, Google Analytics, Quantcast, and Typepad Stats allows me to get information on how well things work and what I need to change.

I blog because it is a closed loop publishing system. 

And, one of the top features I look for in a Green Data Center is whether the engineers and operators use control theory to build closed loop feedbacks.

How else do you know if things are working the way you expect?

Nicholas Carr has a blog post on blogging.

Surface tensions

October 15, 2008

In the new issue of the Atlantic, veteran blogger Andrew Sullivan writes a thoughtful and generous paean to blogging, which he calls - and he means it more as compliment than as criticism - "a superficial medium":

By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy. No one wants to read a 9,000-word treatise online. On the Web, one-sentence links are as legitimate as thousand-word diatribes—in fact, they are often valued more. And, as Matt Drudge told me when I sought advice from the master in 2001, the key to understanding a blog is to realize that it’s a broadcast, not a publication. If it stops moving, it dies. If it stops paddling, it sinks.

Nicholas references Andrew Sullivan’s “Why I Blog”

For centuries, writers have experimented with forms that evoke the imperfection of thought, the inconstancy of human affairs, and the chastening passage of time. But as blogging evolves as a literary form, it is generating a new and quintessentially postmodern idiom that’s enabling writers to express themselves in ways that have never been seen or understood before. Its truths are provisional, and its ethos collective and messy. Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

by Andrew Sullivan

Why I Blog

Andrew makes excellent points.

Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

Anyone who has blogged his thoughts for an extended time will recognize this world. We bloggers have scant opportunity to collect our thoughts, to wait until events have settled and a clear pattern emerges. We blog now—as news reaches us, as facts emerge.

The blog remained a superficial medium, of course. By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy.

But the superficiality masked considerable depth—greater depth, from one perspective, than the traditional media could offer. The reason was a single technological innovation: the hyperlink. An old-school columnist can write 800 brilliant words analyzing or commenting on, say, a new think-tank report or scientific survey. But in reading it on paper, you have to take the columnist’s presentation of the material on faith, or be convinced by a brief quotation (which can always be misleading out of context). Online, a hyperlink to the original source transforms the experience.

But blogging requires an embrace of such hazards, a willingness to fall off the trapeze rather than fail to make the leap.

Some of the points I most attached to are:

It renders a writer and a reader not just connected but linked in a visceral, personal way. The only term that really describes this is friendship. And it is a relatively new thing to write for thousands and thousands of friends.

A good blog is your own private Wikipedia.

And, then I realized differences I am trying to do with the Green Data Center blog.

A traditional writer is valued by readers precisely because they trust him to have thought long and hard about a subject, given it time to evolve in his head, and composed a piece of writing that is worth their time to read at length and to ponder. Bloggers don’t do this and cannot do this—and that limits them far more than it does traditional long-form writing.

The torrent of blogospheric insights, ideas, and arguments places a greater premium on the person who can finally make sense of it all, turning it into something more solid, and lasting, and rewarding.

The one big point Andrew missed for Why I Blog is the metrics. I know how many people view a post in RSS readers and click on links. I can see when search engines bring traffic. The problem with traditional publishing is it is open loop.  Adaptable efficient designs have closed loop control systems.  Publishing on a blog with tools like Feedburner, Google Analytics, Quantcast, and Typepad Stats allows me to get information on how well things work and what I need to change.

I blog because it is a closed loop publishing system. 

And, one of the top features I look for in a Green Data Center is whether the engineers and operators use control theory to build closed loop feedbacks.

How else do you know if things are working the way you expect?

Nicholas Carr has a blog post on blogging.

Surface tensions

October 15, 2008

In the new issue of the Atlantic, veteran blogger Andrew Sullivan writes a thoughtful and generous paean to blogging, which he calls - and he means it more as compliment than as criticism - "a superficial medium":

By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy. No one wants to read a 9,000-word treatise online. On the Web, one-sentence links are as legitimate as thousand-word diatribes—in fact, they are often valued more. And, as Matt Drudge told me when I sought advice from the master in 2001, the key to understanding a blog is to realize that it’s a broadcast, not a publication. If it stops moving, it dies. If it stops paddling, it sinks.

Nicholas references Andrew Sullivan’s “Why I Blog”

For centuries, writers have experimented with forms that evoke the imperfection of thought, the inconstancy of human affairs, and the chastening passage of time. But as blogging evolves as a literary form, it is generating a new and quintessentially postmodern idiom that’s enabling writers to express themselves in ways that have never been seen or understood before. Its truths are provisional, and its ethos collective and messy. Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

by Andrew Sullivan

Why I Blog

Andrew makes excellent points.

Yet the interaction it enables between writer and reader is unprecedented, visceral, and sometimes brutal. And make no mistake: it heralds a golden era for journalism.

Anyone who has blogged his thoughts for an extended time will recognize this world. We bloggers have scant opportunity to collect our thoughts, to wait until events have settled and a clear pattern emerges. We blog now—as news reaches us, as facts emerge.

The blog remained a superficial medium, of course. By superficial, I mean simply that blogging rewards brevity and immediacy.

But the superficiality masked considerable depth—greater depth, from one perspective, than the traditional media could offer. The reason was a single technological innovation: the hyperlink. An old-school columnist can write 800 brilliant words analyzing or commenting on, say, a new think-tank report or scientific survey. But in reading it on paper, you have to take the columnist’s presentation of the material on faith, or be convinced by a brief quotation (which can always be misleading out of context). Online, a hyperlink to the original source transforms the experience.

But blogging requires an embrace of such hazards, a willingness to fall off the trapeze rather than fail to make the leap.

Some of the points I most attached to are:

It renders a writer and a reader not just connected but linked in a visceral, personal way. The only term that really describes this is friendship. And it is a relatively new thing to write for thousands and thousands of friends.

A good blog is your own private Wikipedia.

And, then I realized differences I am trying to do with the Green Data Center blog.

A traditional writer is valued by readers precisely because they trust him to have thought long and hard about a subject, given it time to evolve in his head, and composed a piece of writing that is worth their time to read at length and to ponder. Bloggers don’t do this and cannot do this—and that limits them far more than it does traditional long-form writing.

The torrent of blogospheric insights, ideas, and arguments places a greater premium on the person who can finally make sense of it all, turning it into something more solid, and lasting, and rewarding.

The one big point Andrew missed for Why I Blog is the metrics. I know how many people view a post in RSS readers and click on links. I can see when search engines bring traffic. The problem with traditional publishing is it is open loop.  Adaptable efficient designs have closed loop control systems.  Publishing on a blog with tools like Feedburner, Google Analytics, Quantcast, and Typepad Stats allows me to get information on how well things work and what I need to change.

I blog because it is a closed loop publishing system. 

And, one of the top features I look for in a Green Data Center is whether the engineers and operators use control theory to build closed loop feedbacks.

How else do you know if things are working the way you expect?