The jackhammer vs. the spoon

Neil MacKenzie passes along this from Boston.com, which came from the blog at 37signals.

Here's the highlight: "37signals says they put a few smart people on a problem, embrace constraints, don't try to solve the wrong problems, focus on precision and take the time to get things right. So instead of using a jackhammer to break out of jail, they use a spoon."

We use 37signals' Basecamp project management platform and swear by it. And we see our company as one that takes a similar approach to our own work.

An earlier version

A couple of early morning thoughts on this last day of January.

• Eric (photo left) exclaimed in an IM yesterday: "Another blog!?" Yes. We're incorporating a blog posting capability in the new burris.com, where I will direct most of my energies soon, but in the meantime too much is being left unsaid. Furthermore, I like to experiment with digital technologies, and the improvements in Google's blogging engine, Blogger, made this revisit to my verbose side tempting.

• This blog, "What am I thinking?", is the latest in my blogging history. First there was the online version of the newsletter I started writing and distributing to clients, prospects and other contacts almost 20 years ago. That was the "Burris Blog." Then came "Golfography," a more photo-driven blog about the "landscapes of golf," where and with whom I played. That was followed by "Golfology," a more shamelessly-driven prospecting tool aimed at marketing decision-makers in the golf business. Next I migrated all three of those blogs to Apple's blogging software in iWeb. It was a different look, a design-driven interface that was fun to work with. Same blog topics, new posts, new look and location. For a bit more than nine months I also tried to keep up with what I called the "Sunday Blog," a communications tool directed to my extended family that was, alas, virtually fruitless in stimulating online conversation.

Then I shut them all off in September 2006. I said I was tired of talking to myself. Very little dialogue, although I must say I would often get positive feedback in conversation. But I wasn't finished experimenting with blogging engines. We tried a WordPress version on a more corporate "Golfology" site. I found it difficult to work with, not as intuitive for me, so I was not as assiduous in keeping it fresh. And in November 2006, after reading an article about companies in the "web 2.0" space, I set up a blog at a site called "Vox" (here). I struggled to figure what to talk about, came up with a topic that I (obviously) still kind of like.

And here we are.

If you are interested in prior posts, check the links at the bottom of this digital page. And for the immediate future, check back here. Who knows what I'll be pondering next?

Work in progress

We're working on a new, more dynamic site for our little company. Here's a rough of how we think we'd like the home page to look. Quickly we want to communicate who we are and what we do, but just as important is sharing what we're doing and what we've done.

The current burris.com is loaded with content. But it doesn't change ... and our little company seems to change a lot. We're trying to fix that.

You know the old saying about the cobbler's kids and their shoes. Well, this is taking longer than I hoped, but I think it'll be worth it.

Blog on

As Burris, the company, prepares to launch a new web presence, I find I need some outlet for capturing what I'm thinking about ... at any given time. So I guess I'm back - at least for the time being - to blogging.

The link in the title will take you to the old Burris Blog, and in addition to that I wrote and kept up with a couple of others. But I just wore out talking to myself.

This time may be different ... or it mayn't be. Not sure. Maybe I'll wear out again sooner rather than later. Or maybe the blogging capability we're adding to the new burris.com will give me the freedom to do what I want in this kind of space. Again, not sure.

But here we are - here I am - again, ready to work out what I'm thinking about, what's on my mind.