Category: Uncategorized
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The Four Myths: Why No One Wants To Buy Your Lousy Software
It doesn’t matter if your software is amazing, no one wants to buy what you’re selling. Customers don’t care what features it has, not really. They care what it can do for them. It’s not until you really spend time with customers that you can find that magical “market fit” and understand the difference between…
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Alpha and Beta of Software Risk
When you customize software, you create more unique risk, and remove yourself from the pool of shared risk. Shared risk is good, as there’s a good chance someone else might encounter a problem before you, and collectively you can encourage the vendor to fix it. Selective unique risk is good because it can be a…
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Control Charts and GTD
I wrote this some while back during my eighth week using Todoist as my task tracking software. Every time I pick up a new one, I start over with what I remember from half-heartedly working through David Allen’s Getting Things Done methodology. It just happens that about four weeks into using Todoist, I started reading…
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A Nephew’s Advice for New Fathers
Be nice to the baby Only gentle tickles Wake up early so Auntie doesn’t know I give the baby candy or ice cream Don’t let the baby go on a boat until old enough. 4 or 5? Don’t let the baby play basketball until 10 or 11 years old. Unless there’s a lower basketball hoop.…
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Ansible, Simple, and Anti-Fragility
Once upon a time, Red Hat acquired a company called Ansible. Right before the transaction closed, The Boss called and said, “Erich, I want you to make Ansible part of Red Hat. Don’t @#$% it up.” That’s when my real adventure with automation began. Ok, the tech is nearly as amazing as the people, but…
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Your podcast made me buy a new phone
I have an iPhone 6. It is not a happy phone. It is sad, angry, and generally disappointed to still be in commission and yearns to be put out on a ice flow. It generally expresses its displeasure by passive aggressively inventing remaining battery percentage, rebooting at whim, and pretending storage is full. So, long…
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Repairing the Crown
Should you ever have to repair a 1950-something Crown Range, they’ve done something smart. I had to figure it out, but it’s smart. Philips head screws are for holding things together (like sides the over doors), and slotted screws are for attaching things onto other things (like hinges). They provided a clear visual signal about…
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How do you measure an elephant?
A couple of years ago, Massimo Ferrari and I created the most extensive and thorough financial evaluation of OpenStack, which we called Elephant in the Room. We talked about it a lot, met a lot of customers doing amazing things, and received a lot of nice press coverage. Pulling together this type of research is…
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Divided Brain, Map & Terrain – Sounds Like ML to Me
Despite the guest, Dr. Iain McGilchrist, explicitly rejecting the metaphor that the brain is like a computer, I can’t help but think about the process of building and incorporating machine learning models. Psychiatrist and author Iain McGilchrist talks about his book, The Master and His Emissary, with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. McGilchrist argues we have…
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When Luck Is Your Strategy
M.R.D. Foot tells a story of an underground agent forced to transport a B-2 wireless set (radio) through a railway station in which German forces were conducting random checks of luggage and personnel. The radio which the agent was carrying was a distinct size and shape and thus easily recognizable to alert police forces. The…