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This blog consists of my (Matt Ballantine's) views and opinions, and doesn't necessarily represent the views of employers past or present.
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Metaphorical Management of IT by Matt Ballantine is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 UK: England & Wales License.
View Article  Reader Survey
I seem to be getting anywhere between 50 and 150 people visiting the site on any one day... I'd like to find out a little more about who you are (if you'd be good enough to share that with me). No motive other than to satisfy some of my curiosity, and maybe shape some articles in the future.

There is a short, five minute survey available at http://www.surveygizmo.com/s3/326546/mattballantineblogsurvey. Be good to hear from you...
View Article  Breaking the print analogies
A nice catch up with Phil Dickinson this lunchtime, and a wide and varied conversation over a sandwich on Charlotte Street.

One connection that we made during our conversation was a fundamental difference that current Web2.0-type services that stream updates (such as Twitter, Facebook or Buzz) have from the Old World. In the Old World, if something was worth writing down, then it probably meant that what ever "it" was meant that the recipients were expected to both read and then action upon "it".

In the Twitterverse (Jeez!), if you try to read, let alone action everything that is posted to which you have subscribed, then you will go mad. These media are there to be grazed. It's casual conversation stuff, "water cooler moments" (or "fag breaks" as it used to be in more nicotine-obsessed times).

If you take a tweet at the value of an old-fashioned memo, you're in trouble. Equally, if you issue out tweets as commandments, you'll be highly frustrated.

Since lunchtime, it's also struck me that this is where email is causing no end of problems. Some people seem to see them in the old context of read and action; others as info-grazing fodder. Conflict thus ensues...