Kyle Baxter has written an excellent review of Cultured Code’s Things:

A productivity application is only as useful as how much users actually use it. A to-do application is utterly useless if users do not use it all of the time — if a user spreads their tasks out across a to-do application and, say, a notebook, they have two places they must reference when working on that project, which wastes time. Ultimately, then, they are likely to stop using the application altogether because it creates little value for them.

Part of the reason I refrained from using a task management system was because most applications required you to take a university course in GTD before actually being able to use them. I don’t want to spend more time maintaining my todo list than actually getting things done from that list.

After reaching the same conclusion as Kyle—that my memory would not suffice as a task management system—I forced myself to develop a GTD workflow. I decided to test both OmniFocus and Things—two of the popular new task management apps for the Mac and iPhone/iPod Touch.

OmniFocus sat stagnant in my Dock for two weeks. I dreaded having to open it up and set up my projects and contexts, so I never actually took the time to do it. It just seemed to require too much of an overhead—too much that I needed to know.

Things, on the other hand, I was able to open up and start working with right away. I started by simply writing down all the things I had to do today. As I continued to use the app, I developed a project and folder hierarchy, and refined my tagging system.

Really, there were only a couple requirements for my ideal GTD app:

• The ability to quickly jot down all the tasks that came to mind.
• Tools to help organize, sort, and filter my tasks.
• Helping me not only to organize, but also to focus on what I have to get done today¹.
• An elegant and simple interface, that looks and behaves like a Mac app.

Things has done all these things right. It doesn’t get in the way, but instead puts the focus on my tasks, and allows me to work like my mind thinks. It still needs some polish, which I’m sure will come with it’s 1.0 release, but already, Cultured Code has accomplished an amazing feat.

They’ve brought the power of productivity to the rest of us.

I’ll be the first to admit that Apple has had more than it’s share of trouble as of late—failed iPhone 3G and MobileMe launches, buggy iPhone 2.0 software, and the iPhone SDK NDA which hinders iPhone developers from sharing code and putting development resources like books into the market.

As a consumer, I had a horrible experience buying an iPhone. It wasn’t the worst experience I’ve had (buying a functional mouse from Best Buy took four trips to the store, and over 30 days), but it wasn’t an Apple experience. We traditionally hold Apple to a higher standard, because they have a history of excellence.

It seems that Apple is experiencing some growing pains. The iPhone 3G, MobileMe, and the iPhone SDK are all amazing products. However, the launch/implementation has left a sour taste in many people’s mouths. From leaving developers out in the cold to losing MobileMe emails to the several hour-long waits for the iPhone 3G.

Apple can’t use the excuse “we didn’t anticipate this much demand” anymore. They are growing up, and have begun to play hard ball with the big boys of the tech industry. If their superb marketing department hypes a product, the rest of the company better be able to handle the demand.

To be honest, I think it’s good that the iPhone and MobileMe launches were the failures they were. No doubt Apple has learned that they are no longer this little fruit company from Cupertino, but a tech superstar with global reach. And while they may be making the greatest products they’ve ever made, the experience they are giving consumers is severely lacking.

I’ve always considered email interviews to be cheap attempts to drive traffic to a site, or a pure lack of writing inspiration. They were always something that I’d skip over in my feed reader.

Then the revelation struck: maybe interviews are actually difficult to get right, making the majority of interviews nothing more than pathetic rhetoric. The fate of an interview rests on the shoulders of the interviewer—most who are uneducated on the topic being discussed, or simply don’t ask meaningful questions.

As I’ve begun to immerse myself in “real” interviews, I’ve grown to appreciate the quality of the questions, the sincerity of the conversation, and the thought-provoking ideas which are discussed. Interviews moved from simply being pre-written questions, to a topic-driven conversation.

Now, I find myself looking forward to reading a good interview.

Coincidentally, this week, a couple of interviews have landed their way in my RSS reader. Taking them like gold, I sat down, and read for 30 minutes. No distractions. No tweets. Just me sitting and reading.

When an article captivates your attention and imagination more than a feature-length, multi-million dollar movie, I think they deserve a link.

The Interviews

Phil Bowell interviews Shawn Blanc - Definitely one of the best interviews I’ve read in awhile. Phil talks to Shawn Blanc—author of my personal favourite blog—about how he began writing, as well as his design process, and even some steps he takes when conducting an email interview. Go grab yourself a cup of your favourite hot beverage, and read this right now.

Kyle Baxter interviews Brent Simmons - Kyle’s blog, TightWind, has quickly moved to the top of my RSS reader. He has a fascinating interview with Brett Simmons, maker of NetNewsWire—my RSS reader of choice, regarding the UI design of iPhone apps. In one sentence, Brent defines the key to developing for the iPhone: “Clarity is more valuable than density.”

And while I’m at it, why not plug some older, notable interviews that I have re-read recently?

The Glenn Wolsey Interview - The one part of this interview that continues to strike me everytime I read it, is actually something that Shawn (the interviewer) mentioned in response to one of Glenn’s remarks.

I almost wonder if The Net has taught us we should write short and quick posts in order to cater to those who want to consume the most amount of information in the least amount of time, thus the nobility of a blogger writing something wonderful and captivating has been lost.

The John Gruber Interview - Undoubtedly the most thoughtful interview I have read—it defines the gold-standard of interviews in my mind. It may be long, but it’s not one of those “skim-every-other-paragraph” articles. You just have to read every word.

Probing the Hive Mind - Chris Bowler reminds me about how much I enjoyed his remarkable interview with Dan Benjamin. Talking about everything and anything, it’s one of those good rainy day reads.

There has been a lot of talk around the web about .Mac’s successor and it’s rumored appearance at WWDC on Monday. It started with the 10.5.3 update changing all .Mac references to a localizable string—%@—as opposed to a hard-coded name, possibly implying that Apple could change the name of .Mac in the OS with a small update.

The rumor grew as references to “MobileMe” were found in Apple patents and iPhone SDK beta strings. Then Apple was discovered to have purchased “me.com” as well as a variety of new top-level .me domains such as apple.me, ipod.me, and itunes.me.

Something is happening with .Mac—everybody knows that. The question remains as to what Apple will do to their web-based software as a service suite. I believe that if Apple plays their cards right, the new .Mac—or MobileMe—will be far bigger, and more important than the 3G iPhone announcement.

The Master Plan

Apple has always wanted full control of the hardware and the software of any device they’ve manufactured. They want you to have the best experience on your Mac, your iPod, and your iPhone. Apple, and more specifically, Steve Jobs, want to be in control of the experience you have with your Apple products.

While your Mac and your iPhone might function and integrate perfectly, there is something missing that connects them. Currently, the only “integration” between the Mac and the iPhone is a two-foot, USB cable that may occasionally get plugged in. That’s not the seamless integration and design that defines the Apple experience.

Apple’s goal—and the reason for their existence—is to integrate and control your experience across all your devices. And while Apple has succeeded at creating a stunning Mac and iPhone experience, there has always been an area that Apple has had little to no control in—the Cloud.

Cloud Computing

Cloud Computing is nothing new—I’ve written about it’s pros and cons before. Apple has a chance to completely revolutionize the cloud computing space. They have the advantage over any other company (Adobe, Google, Microsoft, etc.) because they already control the hardware and software. Combine this seamless online experience with your desktop, laptop, and iPhone, and you’ll never have to leave the cohesiveness of the Apple environment.

Apple can begin to change the way people use the Internet even with existing .Mac technologies. Kyle Baxter—author of TightWind, one of my favourite new blogs—beat me to publishing a brilliant piece on the integration of .Mac with the iPhone:

I can imagine Apple enabling iDisk on the iPhone so you are never “disconnected” from it — it connects more or less invisibly to your iPhone. No FTP login, password, and directory data to input, no UI even necessarily needed to login and connect — it does it itself.

Placing a file on your iPhone would not require the annoying steps of mounting it on your desktop, dropping it into your phone, and dismounting it. Instead, you would just drop the file in your iDisk, and suddenly that file is available to all of your devices, seamlessly. Forgot to print out a homework assignment or paper? No big deal; just access your iDisk on your iPhone and email it.

Effectively, your iPhone and your Mac would be tied together at all times by shared storage, whether they are physically connected or not.

This is just the beginning of the power that a connected experience will bring to the iPhone. Forget about an Internet connection simply meaning the ability to surf the web. The Internet will begin to be associated with the term “connected”. When connected to Apple’s online “Me” service, all of your devices will sync up—contacts, calendars, emails, passwords, and notes.

But imagine the possibilities beyond that. Imagine if Apple positions this “Me” service along with it’s mobile division rumored to be called “MobileMe”, as a consumer’s identity management. This service will know the podcasts and RSS feeds you subscribe to. It will know your user names and passwords for all the popular social networking sites. It will know the IP addresses of all your devices at any time, and will be able to access any file, located on any device at a moments notice. It will know precisely where you are via GPS or triangulation. Yes, it may sound terrifying that one company has all this power—but imagine the potential.

No one company has ever been able to successfully pull off a move this big, because they simply do not have the leverage that Apple does. They did not have control of both the hardware and the software. And that is what cloud computing is truly about.

The Apple Way

.Mac is not going to be overhauled. It’s going to be entirely revamped from the bottom up. And if Apple does this right, they can become the first company with a complete 360° solution. In order for this to catch on though, they need to do a couple things:

1. Give it away: In order to do this right, Apple has to make it free. Free as in Google free. Make the online services accessible to everyone. Make it so that you get a free access to “Apple Online Services” with the purchase of an iPhone or Mac. Make it so that pro users can pay a minimal annual fee to upgrade their features.
2. Ensure that it’s more reliable than Twitter: If I’m going to be sending you all my private information, I want to be sure that I can access it at any time. And having it work 24/7 would be a bonus as well. .Mac isn’t really known for it’s reliability and stability—hopefully Apple will work to improve this before launch.
3. Don’t duplicate services already in place: I love making .Mac Web Galleries. They’re beautiful, dead-simple to make, and integrate perfectly with the iApps and Aperture. But I’d much rather use Flickr with an established community. Don’t try to replace Facebook or Google or Flickr or Twitter. Make the new .Mac’s goal simple: To integrate all Apple devices with services on the Internet. Integrate the Apple experience with other online services (i.e. Flickr and YouTube upload from the iPhone)

Apple has the opportunity to do something game-changing with .Mac. Something that can, potentially, be bigger than the 3G iPhone. Brett Peters says it best: “Faster bandwidth allows me to do the same things I already do, only … faster. It’s equivalent to an incremental increase in storage capacity or processor speed. That’s just not sexy.”

Steve Jobs is not going to go on stage, come Monday, and announce a 3G iPhone that everybody knows about, without telling us the super-cool Star Trek-like things that we will be able to do because of this 3G technology. RIM, Nokia, Samsung—better watch closely.

Theoretically, technology exists to make our lives easier. In the real world however, it’s not that simple. In many ways, technology over complicates even the simplest tasks in our lives. And so the story continues with RSS.

RSS is one of those technologies that seems like a revolutionary way to simplify your life at first, but ends with tireless hours of complex organization and wasted time. At the very core, RSS is a brilliant idea - bringing the news you care about to you, instead of you going to the news. However, the existing RSS readers ruin the simple foundation that RSS was built upon. Once again, software is shown to be the major bottleneck in the development of a platform.

The creation of any revolutionary new technology represents a major paradigm shift. However, in order to explain a new technology to a person, you must compare it to an existing technology. Sometimes these comparisons don’t always fit perfectly (for instance, see the original Macintosh manual where the Finder is described as “a central hallway in the Macintosh house”). Two different comparisons are typically used when explaining RSS - email inboxes and newspapers.

RSS as an Inbox

It’s no coincidence that the most common way to consume RSS is similar to one of the most common uses of a computer. Everyone uses and understands the way an email inbox works, and so, that knowledge is translated into an RSS reader that functions like an inbox. You refresh your RSS feeds much as you get new mail in your email client. You sort your feeds by folders much as you do - or should do - with email. And there is a big annoying number that marks your “unread count”, or the number of new RSS items you have to “read”.

This is where the comparison between RSS and email fails.

RSS is not email and shouldn’t be treated like it. Most email is specifically directed at you, and requires your attention to read and possibly take action. RSS feeds, on the other hand, are not specifically for you. They don’t all require your attention, and need to be “read”.

How many times have I come home from a weekend away, only to find the RSS count in the thousands. RSS quickly becomes a burden that is dreaded. And so the question remains - is there a better way to get your content?

RSS as a Newspaper

Recently, there has been a push towards a different approach for RSS. Instead of treating RSS feeds as emails in an inbox, Dustin MacDonlad’s new app, Times, takes a new - actually, an old - approach to RSS. Alex Wooley, a casual RSS user, sums up the game-changing nature of Times nicely:

Before the introduction of Times, it’s fair to say I wasn’t really an RSS worshiper. I had NetNewsWire installed on my system (after they made it free) and opened it once in a while (where I would be blasted with 200 feeds which I really didn’t want to have to read through). So, I didn’t want or have a need to read RSS feeds. Upon downloading Times, I knew I’d been hit with a new kind of RSS feeder, something I hadn’t experienced before, something quintessentially different.

Times frees RSS from the dreaded “unread count”, and allows you to consume RSS feeds in a different, more refreshing way. The philosophy is that you will be able to scan headlines and find the content that is appealing to you without having to go through and “read” every single article. While it’s an interesting approach, it is suited for more casual RSS users. When you begin to have hundreds of feeds in your arsenal, Times quickly becomes cumbersome and useless.