cap’n crunch doughnut, originally uploaded by mokin.

Still life with Bacon Maple Bar and Voodoo Doughnut, originally uploaded by HPZ.

voodoo doughnut, originally uploaded by Poisson.

blood-filled voodoo doughnut, originally uploaded by mokin.

I’ve got to get to Portland soon and check this place out. Cool menu, interesting attitude.

Grape Ape
(raised doughnut with vanilla frosting and grape powder)

Dirt
(raised doughnut covered with vanilla glaze and oreo cookies)

Arnold Palmer
(cake doughnut covered with lemon and tea powder)

San Dimas
(cake with three types of chocolate on top)

Butter Fingering
(Devils food, vanilla, and crushed Butterfinger)

Neapolitan
(chocoalte doughnut with vanilla frosting and strawberry quick powder)

Triple Chocolate Penetration
(chocolate doughnut, chocolate glaze, and cocoa-puffs)

Voodoo Doughnut
(voodoo doll doughnut)

Dirty Snowball
(chocolate cake doughnut covered with pink marshmallow glaze and surprise filling)

Apple Fritter
(apple/glaze/doughnut as big as your head)

The Memphis Mafia
(chocolate chips/banana/ peanutbutter/glaze big!)

Portland Creme
(raised doughnut filled with creme and covered in chocolate with two eyes)

Cock-n-Balls
(Bachlorette party favorite, tripple cream filled, with your favorite saying written right on it. Comes in its own pink box. $4.95 Order ahead as supplies can be limited.)

Nyquil Glazed and pepto-bismol (currently on hold)

No Name
A doughnut so good we couldn’t come up with a better name. It has chocolate rice crispys and peanutbutter on it.

VEGAN
(thats right, vegan doughnuts! assorted flavors, come in and eat many)

• Phil McKinney of Killer Innovations on improv
  Some interesting stuff here on creativity and improv, although he takes it someplace I wouldn’t. Sitting by yourself and figuring out what to write is creative, but it’s not collaborative, and so I’d suggest it’s not really fulfilling the great stuff from improv.
• Killer Innovations – Phil McKinney on Listening Skill
  Listen to the podcast if you want some great tactics for being a better interviewer. He’s not talking about interviewing really, but focusing here on listening…one of the most crucial and difficult aspects of interviewing.

Originally uploaded by Victor Lombardi

, who criticizes the addition of arrival data to the NYC subways, because that info shifts the experience into a waiting experience. It’s funny, because I had just spent 40 minutes at the San Francisco airport waiting for an arriving passenger, where they had no signage whatsoever about the different flights. I found it incredibly frustrating and tedious, since I couldn’t stop watching and couldn’t plan what I should do for the next 5, 10, 20, etc. minutes. I was musing to myself that more information – LOTS more information – makes waiting more tolerable. In-flight maps give you more information, allowing you to participate vicariously in the flight you are on (rather than passively as a butt-in-a-seat). Add in the good-vibes of transparency and it’s obvious…

And then Challis blogged the story about the post office removing clocks which hit the blogosphere with a predictable critique — the post office is playing Big Brother by removing info that would make us less satisfied with the experience. Challis would probably agree with my call for transparency and participation, but what would Victor think about the post office? Do the clocks shift the waiting time to something less pleasant?

Clearly, it depends on the person, their frame of mind, and the location. Lots of context to consider. But the contrasting examples seemed provocative.

Snacklash is the only thing worth reading in the recent Wired feature on snack culture (summary: lots of shorty-short-short stuff proliferates).

Snack culture is an illusion. We have more of everything now, both shorter and longer: one-minute movies and 12-hour epics; instant-gratification Web games and Sid Meiers Civilization IV. Freed from the time restrictions of traditional media, we’re developing a more nuanced awareness of the right length for different kinds of cultural experiences…Yes, it sometimes seems as if we’re living off a cultural diet of blog posts and instant messages – until we find ourselves losing an entire weekend watching season three of The Wire. The truth is, we have more snacks now only because the menu itself has gotten longer.

This sums up the challenge I’ve been in semi-denial of for a while now. My own output of content. For as content creators, we face the same challenges as well.

The posts here on this blog vary in length and thought and time. I’ve started the Quickies as a channel for passing on a link of interest with one or two key thoughts. And there are the longer pieces every so often that summarize an experience or an issue. If you go back and look at the earlier days of this blog, you’ll see a lack of polish and focus, and a lot less content by me.

Now take a look at FreshMeat. The earliest entries are on par with some of stuff I blog now (longer, more focused), but the later entries are like small theses. They are really in-depth, long, and demanding-as-hell to write, especially when a simpler blog entry is easily produced and delivered.

FreshMeat got longer and more intense, as did the blog. A blog entry now is more substantial than a FreshMeat started out to be. It’s an escalation.

And then there’s an infrastructure issue. FreshMeat originally was an email list, with a web thing as secondary distribution. But running a mailing list is increasingly demanding as customers of an ISP. Most don’t want you doing anything like that; moving an existing set of names to a new host sometimes means that everyone has to opt-in again. I’ve got over 1000 names, granted the list is a bit stale, but I can’t imagine I’d get more than 50% re-registering after 2 years of silence.

I still get asked “when’s FreshMeat coming out?” because people enjoyed it. They may be not the same people who make the commitment to read a blog on a regular basis.

The dilemma, then, to readers here, who have a good perspective on my brand and on content and all that, what makes sense? Should FreshMeat be retired? Integrated into the blog? What should the brand be? If I could send one last email to the 1000 names, what should I tell them?

I’m stuck on this one, and I would love your thoughts! Please!

I will be speaking (topic: Seventeen Ways To Not Suck At Research)) at the IDSA Northeast District Conference, held at the Rhode Island School of Design on April 20-22. My presentation will be on Sunday, April 22. I’m hoping to swing through Boston on my way out to Providence.

• Nussbaum deconstructs “conversation” vis a vis online media
  “Conversations are not equal…someone starts it, a select group participate, others just listen, another small group iterates and changes…If conversation is to become the model for media, then we have to understand the role of the curator or editor of the conversation.
• Parnters asking architects and designers for separate bedrooms
  NYT suggests an emerging pattern – more couples choosing to sleep separately. It’s not about sex, it’s about our desperate need for a good night’s sleep.

• I.R.S. Letting Tax Lawyers Write Rules – “it’s the fox designing the hen house”
  When co-creation is not such a good thing?

• “Most of my Chinese friends are Jewish.”
  An adopted Chinese girl grows up to have Bat Mitzvah. Nice look at an aspect of our times by focusing on a very human story of one person.

Today must be solicitation day. We received a curious phone call earlier in the day from a firm that – as far as I can tell – helps strategically market creative service businesses. A very large designerly such business (former client) was name-checked several times. I was buttered up with references to someone in the media who said great things about me, while the second time this came up I was told that they can’t tell me who it is because they never reveal their sources (I hadn’t asked). Sources?! When I explained to them that we were probably too small for them (going by the size of firms they had worked for) they told me that their fees were “up there.”

Later our HR alias got an email from a recruiting firm wanting to help out. The first line of the email reads
Hello Prtugal Consulting
and then of course goes on to talk about excellent and commitment and all that! But they managed to get TWO spelling errors in my name! So much for attention to detail. And they are contacting me to solicit my business? So much for good communication.

I’ve received any number of calls over the last few months from large Indian operations wanting to see if I can outsource some of my work to them. Hmm. Not yet, anyway.

Business development is hard, and very hard to do well. That’s clear from either side of the conversation!

It’s only March but I’m already sick of it and that means it’s going to get a whole lot worse before it gets better.

The phrase (something) fatigue

As in Bono fatigue
Social networking fatigue
In an online discussion group yesterday I saw a reference to profile fatigue

(similar to social networking fatigue above)
Scandal fatigue
Clinton fatigue (1999!)
Katrina fatigue

I think that (something) fatigue is the new (something) rage

.