The DVD is done and shipping! Here’s an overview of the nearly 2 hours of awesome stuff you get when you order your copy.
The DVD has a pod like design. You 2.0 is a short film, to keep things moving and interesting and not waste your time. It’s designed to be something you can show to someone who knows nothing about life hacking, GTD, or any other weird terminology and they’ll finally get it. And if you already know all about that stuff, you’ll still get something out of it.
The rest of the DVD is extended interviews with both people in the film and not in the film. It’s cut down into individual pods on different topics by each speaker. And the cool thing is you can sort the pods by speaker or category.
So say you watch the film, and then you want to know more about GTD. Well you can go to David Allen’s interview and get much more in depth. Or you want to know more about the science and studies done on how we work. Gloria Mark, a professor of informatics, has you covered.
Here’s a DVD outline:
The clips above are sorted as you see them by speaker, with the option to play all or individually. You can also sort them by topic:
- Creativity
- 21st Century Work
- Productivity
- Life Hacks
- Everything Else
Everything you see above comes out to a total run time of about 2 hours, and sadly that’s how much you can cram onto a DVD. So with every purchase of the DVD, you’ll also get online access to even more interviews, including Danny O’Brien, new start-ups from TechCrunch50, and more podcasts.
Sound good? Cool!
Writing on a manual [typewriter] makes you slower in a good way, I think. You don’t revise as much, you just think more, because you know you’re going to have to retype the entire fucking thing. Which is a big stop on just slapping anything down and playing with it.
- Will Self
Reading the title you can probably guess what this program can do, or more what it can’t do. The above quote got me thinking about the process of writing on a typewriter and I was surprised to not be able to find any program that could mimic that interaction.
So on a whim I ran with this weird idea and turned to Elance, where I found Denis Sokol in Russia and he created this program.
It’s super, super simple and basic. All you can do is type in one direction. You can’t delete, you can’t copy, you can’t paste. You can save and print. And you can switch between black text on white and green on black; full screen and window.
The program runs through Java, so it should work on any operating system, but make sure you have the latest version of Java here. Feel free to share, modify, and post the program however you like. All I ask is that you please reference this site with a link either directly to this post or the site (http://www.lifehackingmovie.com).
Hope you enjoy and let me know what are you thoughts are on using it.
This software is licensed under the CC-GNU GPL version 2.0 or later.
by Joey on April 12, 2009
Over the past few days I’ve been going through lots of archival footage for the documentary. The best and easiest place is the Prelinger Archives on the Internet Archive. They have over 2000 films from the 20s-80s, all available to watch, download, and use however you like.
I found a few clips, which I posted below, that I thought were kind of funny and appropriate given the whole economic situation we’re in.
The first is on Banks and Credit. I think all bankers should have watched this so, you know, they’d actually know how a bank works.
[click to continue…]
I have Crohn’s Disease. I’ve been hospitalized twice in two different cities that are not where I’m living, so tracking down my medical records has always been an issue.
I’m on the right medication now, and I haven’t had any issues for over a year, but the lack of warning symptoms always worries me that I could have a flare up any time, any place.
So far Haiti I made a digital dog tag. Basically it’s a USB drive with emergency information, medical records, and other important data.
Here’s what’s on it:
- Emergency Text File – This file, named !Emergency so it stays at the top, has all my personal information (full legal name, date of birth, current address), illnesses I have, medications I’m on, and a few emergency contacts with “In case of emergency, contact” in a few different languages. I also have a printed copy.
- Passport Image – A scan of my passport
- Medical Records – I asked my doctor’s office to make me a copy of everything they have. I ran it all through my Canon Pixma all-in-one (much cheaper than a ScanSnap) and saved it as one big PDF.
I like to play worst case scenarios in my mind, and of course the obvious one is what happens if I lose the drive or it gets stolen. Identity security versus medical safety.
I decided to take the risk and not password protect my records because I’d rather be a healthy victim of identity theft than something worse.
I’ve put the drive on a metal chain which I’ll wear around my neck, so it should be very secure.
Any ideas for anything else that should go on the drive?
I’m leaving early tomorrow morning. Follow me to see how things go.
Since I found out I’m going to Haiti this Saturday about a week ago, I’ve had to fast track learning everything I need to know for traveling to a third world country.
Here are some resources I found ranging from travel sites to recommended vaccines to common phrases.
The US Department of State has an international travel section with information on every country, as well as travel advisories. There’s also a section to register your trip.
I have no idea what the internet situation will be where I’m staying, so it would be nice if they had an SMS alert option. But this is still a good place to start and get a basic rundown of what you need to do when traveling.
CDC Traveler’s Health / MD Travel Health
Since I’m not going with a group, I had to find out what vaccines I needed myself. These two sites had a great rundown on what diseases I might encounter and what I should be vaccinated against, as well as health precautions while I’m there (don’t drink the water).
Getting Vaccinated
This was actually pretty tricky and really depends on each county. The best thing to do would be to ask your doctor where you can get vaccinated. I don’t have a primary care doctor, but I had heard the Department of Health in my county administered travel vaccines for free. However, when I called them they said that was one of the first things to get cut this year.
I eventually found a travel clinic that had everything in stock. I already had about half the vaccines needed due to all the college requirements, so I only needed Hepatitis A and Typhoid. Insurance usually doesn’t cover this, so they don’t bother checking, so I had to pay in full ($266) and try to get reimbursed later. They also gave me a prescription for anti-malaria drugs.
Country Background
When I found out I was going to Haiti the first thing I did was turn to Wikipedia. The great thing about country profiles is you can get a good gist of everything quickly and then have the option to read further into the more detailed articles about the country.
I’ve also been reading Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder and watched The Agronomist, both good primers to the history of Haiti. Look for recommended books and movies in articles or blog posts.
Language
I’ve traveled to other countries before and always managed to get by with English, but I always wished I knew at least a little bit of the native language to make things easier and not be the lame American.
So this time I’m trying to learn as many Creole phrases as I can in a week. Since Creole is not the most popular of languages, there aren’t that many resources for it.
I’m a big fan of Pimsleur, so I got the basic Creole course which I’ll listen to on my 7 hour drive to the airport. If you happen to be interested in Creole specific sites with phrases, the best ones I found is this PDF from Hands on Disaster Response and Traveling Haiti.
I’ve converted the phrases to flash cards to memorize. I’ve also researched phrases specific to what I’m doing and most likely need, such as, “Can I take your picture?”
Remember to follow me as I go around Haiti.
Photo by MARK EDWARDS
Yep, this Saturday I’m flying from Ft. Lauderdale to Port-au-Prince, and I’ll be there for about 5 days.
I only found out about this last week. I was at a meeting for a service group I’m in, when someone I’ve talked to maybe once before started telling me about how he wants to build a clinic in Haiti and film a documentary about it, but doesn’t know the first thing about filmmaking. So he was wondering if I could go with him on this preliminary trip to help him set up the documentary for the summer.
Enjoying an adventure, I of course said yes (to my family’s dismay). And yes, I’m going to Haiti with an acquaintance. Just goes to prove Malcolm Gladwell and the power of weak ties.
So I’m going to do some filmming, get this documentary set up, and of course (and the biggest personal draw) take lots of pictures. I know this will be an eye opening experience.
I’ll be posting more on preparing for the trip, but all I can say now is my shoulder is pretty sore from the vaccines I got today. And of course I’ll be tweeting while there, so follow me.
Let me know if you have any Haiti/remote traveling tips.
by Joey on February 23, 2009
I was at one of the nearby cafes last Friday where I noticed this sign. “Internet-Free Zone on Weekends.” I wonder if this is to encourage people to read or socialize on the weekends. Or maybe something more practical, such as not having students hog a table for the whole day. Either way I thought it was interesting and I haven’t seen it anywhere else.
