Performed in June, 2010, by the San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus and the San Francisco Girls Chorus Alumnae, accompanied by the Community Women’s Orchestra.
Sorry for the shaky camera work, but the sound quality is surprisingly good on this little Flip cam.
hurt myself carrying stuff fm y’day’s Costco run, but now have stick blender, Brita, and (indispensable to every US household!) Corningware #
added to Getting Started with Solaris playlist: System Services, Networking http://bit.ly/bsdlfj #
we tame our monsters, both current and historical, by ridiculing them: http://bit.ly/bB50Y9 #
Rule of thumb: when lack of something annoys me more than 3 times, just buy the damn thing already. Today, it’s a toaster. #
recovered: Fibre Channel Concepts – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/5m3zGK #
RT @oraclenerd: Thoughts on #Exadata – http://www.oraclenerd.com/2010/05/exadata-quotes.html #
@vdotw generally younger people seem to be worse at estimating ages. Especially men. #
@Chuckumentary Heavens, were you in any doubt? If I’m expected to be a bland corp rep online, I fail big time. Fortunately, not expected. #
FB procedure for when you think a friend’s account has been hacked is singularly unhelpful. I don’t have another way to contact this person. #
RT @SamHarrisOrg: Found: the most infuriating person on earth… http://nyti.ms/dlOyQo – She, like the pope, should be arrested. Sickening. #
A friend tweets in Italian, I translate: The barista across the street says: ‘I’m married, but it’s nothing serious.’ #
@serendipitousP If I’d had the Legos I wanted as a kid, I might have grown up to be an architect. Must buy some now. #
the funniest sign I have yet to see on the Internet, and my mother took the photo: http://bit.ly/ctRK2c #
Flu + allergies + cramps. Can I declare today over and just sleep til tomorrow? #
RT @davest: Strong women: http://wp.me/pkZF7-5i – nice to hear from a man who loves and is proud of strong women! #
aww, they’re so cute… Always makes me think of @italylogue http://bit.ly/cRFs4f #
@italylogue meh, not enough Cannavaro, too much Ronaldo. 😉 #
@italylogue not sure, I’ll try to find out. #
@rbanffy Heard the page owner panicked and removed it after threats, FB recovered it when he had 2nd thoughts. it’s there now #
@italylogue Ross says it might be Little Tony: http://bit.ly/deitsq #
today I’ll plant my kitchen garden in 2 big pots on the balcony: basil, thyme, sage, coriander, nasturtium, parsley, rosemary… #
Do journalists ever feel embarrassed about the drivel they put out? #
added a smugmug gallery to Italian Train Graffiti http://bit.ly/b7V6Sl #
morning smile Traveling in New Zealand http://bit.ly/a7D0Eq #
the first manual/user guide I ever wrote: http://bit.ly/btYUgS #
Thx to TiVo/hulu I don’t have to worry about when a show will be on. But find I barely even care anymore IF it will. I’m my own soap opera. #
Gotta say, my tweeps, that the intense focus on #Lost seems a little Over The Top. After all, this isn’t BUFFY we’re talking about. 😉 #
We never see the POV of the classic Italian mamma. Does she get sick of the role? It’s not one you ever get to resign from, apparently. #
New! Index of songs: Translations of Italian Popular Songs http://bit.ly/bbLchE #
4.5 hours?!? You people are crazy. I’ll watch Gone with the Wind on Netflix, rather. #
Right, I’m siging off Twitter for the night. Have zero interest in a million tweets about Lost. #
Face it, girls – I’m older and have more insurance – http://bit.ly/bnKU6c #
oh, damn, I’ve GOT to go to New York! To see Angela Lansbury in A Little Night Music. #
@bloatedlesbian lord I hope you’re being facetious, otherwise I will have to slap you. #
@NomdeB so did you get rained on in the end? #
The very purest form of birth control ever devised. Ever, http://nyti.ms/byHw6x #
We have disproved the statement that There are no Atheists in Foxholes http://bit.ly/adqRIe #
Church wants Ital govt to encourage couples to have children; 50 have none. http://bit.ly/bQVWkS – Could get into some major snark here… #
Potting soil left over from herb planting. This is unacceptable. Ordered a larger planter box, will buy heirloom tomato seedlings. #
@bubbva that’d be great, thanks! is it something I can carry back on Caltrain? I prefer not to drive if possible #
@NomdeB saw that, but don’t have a place to hang them outside. Considering hanging houseplants inside, which is effectively a greenhouse #
@bubbva cool, thanks. I may decide to drive in late Thurs as I have a friend to pick up at SFO that evening. #
RT @openstorage: Fishworks – Sun Storage 7000 2010.Q1.1.0 Release: With our apologies for the delay in announcing here http://bit.ly/aoBPgz #
#techcastlive tomw 10am PDT w Joost Pronk on Oracle Solaris virtualization; bring your ?s – he’s a great explainer! http://bit.ly/9nnZRj #
Ross took some amazing photos in SF, so far available only on FB, but I stole these great portraits of me: http://bit.ly/9UZUHk #
There was a hummingbird fluttering outside the balcony door just now, apparently attracted by the little shiny mirrors. Must get a feeder! #
white paper: How to use Oracle Solaris DTrace in Oracle Solaris and OpenSolaris System http://bit.ly/cEcgfd #
can’t tell if I’ve got a cold, bad allergies, or some combination of the two (or something else). Whatever it is, enough already! #
@gracekboyle I saw the biggest tool is a disconcerting phrase alongside your Twitter icon. #
Italian senator proposes starting school a month later to help tourism http://bit.ly/bDsgU7 #
@NomdeB been wanting a hibiscus plant, but they weren’t in yet at the garden center I went to. Bougainvillea wdn’t survive the wind. #
@dfugate At the very least, that is /grounds/ for spousal abuse. #
My six degrees of separation is so weird it amazes even me. I think I’m almost to Kevin Bacon now. #
The scenery included an exquisite @oracle banner! I think it’s the airport! RT Paris: day one http://u.nu/6d2ja (via @GuyKawasaki) #
@NomdeB thanks for the tip. I was planning on taking my Italian guest there as a cultural experience. 😉 #
The older, HTML portions of my site infected with malware again. How did this happen? #
just wasted a couple of minutes figuring out I have to register for blip.tv support separately from blip.tv site. Guys, fix this. #
starting soon! TechCast Live http://bit.ly/9qXG7R – Joost on virtualization, bring your questions! #
#TechCastLive http://bit.ly/9qXG7R – Joost on virtualization – LIVE NOW! #
Looking for more info on Oracle Solaris virtualization after #techcastlive? Try here for lots of video: http://bit.ly/9yxLX1 #
Wow, I feel like absolute crap. Need emergency delivery of hot toddies, chocolate, and hugs! #
RT @macsun: Accelerating Cloud Adoption via Standards & Collaboration panel webcast. See it here: http://snia.org/cloud #
RT @SAGEProgram: You know you’ve been in India too long when… http://bit.ly/b2x1Dv #
@bubbva great, thanks. Hoping I feel well enough to make it in this week. #
@davewiner Funny, I would have been thrilled to get flowers. #
@robbogio wil you make it out to this coast this time? #
Young people with a well-off family behind them go abroad, and get along. All the others are left behind. http://bit.ly/9ezJml #
Busi quit state broadcaster RAI’s flagship evening TG1 news in protest at its allegedly pro-government editorial line. http://bit.ly/dvYvY6 #
no need for Italian Church to imitate the German Church and set up a special commission to look into sex abuse cases. http://bit.ly/d89MAh #
@NomdeB no, haven’t got around to trying it yet. #
Sorting out iPhones (moving mine to a corp plan), got a (very helpful) AT&T rep named Deidre. There are a few of us around. #
so excited about new toaster, had toast (with cheese, olives, salad, chutney…) for dinner last night. Now don’t want toast for breakfast. #
looks as if my site has been unquarantined by Google – I’d be grateful for confirmation! – Countries Beginning with I http://bit.ly/1194h9 #
new video: The Problems Solaris Solves – 4 – Diagnosing Live Systems with DTrace – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/amVoJX #
@ben @dogcow hmm, love Vegemite, but it’s a luxury import here. Never tried it with onion. #
@trine thanks! Now let’s see whether I’ve pinpointed source of the infection – might be the old Windows machine I’ve been updating html on #
@jwillie The Lipizzaner Stallions and Other Wonders of Vienna http://bit.ly/90yRCe – and, as Billy Joel says, Vienna waits for you. #
@hemantmehta do your students think you have a high, squeaky voice that mutters unintelligible phrases? #fb #
Countries Beginning with I Wouldnt Surprise Me a Bit http://bit.ly/a3j7aG #
@juliebenz or there’s something seriously wrong with her tastebuds. Poor thing. #
RT @vambenepe: Ellison calls Exadata our iPhone (http://bit.ly/ckuqlF via @ORCL_Linux) < Less likely to forget a prototype in a bar < ROFL #
Feeling whiny and irritable. This is what happens when they try to make me write (shudder) marketing words. #
@bubbva thanks. Still hoping for tomorrow, but we’ll see. Pretty dragged out at the moment. #
@jeffreytaylor Nothing like has-been desperation to change a once-honorable man’s views… Of course, we knew he was desperate with Palin… #
@Britopian I had some similar thoughts a few years ago: Communicating with Your Customers http://bit.ly/asKwOj #
RT @PizzoC: I may have gotten up but I’m damned if I’m going to accomplish anything. – Amen, brother! Not sure I even got up. Damn sinuses #
Combating hatred with humor: Friendly Atheist by @hemantsblog The Boot Protest http://bit.ly/cMcG3D #
way to go British Airways: btw strikes, ash cloud, & incompetent booking staff, daughter having v hard time changing her tix back to Italy #
so much to do, if only I could find two brain cells to rub together. #
RT @OracleBlogs: Video Whiteboard on Exadata Smart Flash Cache – http://ow.ly/17wwLb #
having tea in hopes it will wake me up for the drive to SFO to pick up a friend coming to visit from Italy. #
@italylogue with pictures? OF COURSE. #
@italylogue do you have a link to the D&G ads they did last time around? was sorely tempted to steal posters out of the Milan metro… #
^^^ can’t get my car out of the damned garage to go get my friend. The parking company better reimburse the taxi she now has to take. #
@italylogue Watching Football http://bit.ly/9LTlEV #
RT @jimgris: Huge thanks & best wishes to @schahn http://bit.ly/bDQSui. OpenSolaris would not have been possible without his leadership . #
speaking Italian intensely, about intense topics, for two hours. Unaccustomed mental exercise! #
@rbanffy true. My mannerisms change when I speak Italian, not sure about personality. Rusty at the moment, though. #
received my advance copy of Tony Hsieh’s Delivering Happiness http://bit.ly/bT1iSR @dhbook – shd make interesting holiday reading #
@dhbook …so the first job offer Tony Hsieh got leaving Harvard? Yup – Oracle. #
@ajkeen I’ll come watch all the Italy games with you, if that helps – guess I’ll need to find somewhere to watch since I don’t have a TV. #
RT @TomBolini: the last masterpiece of Caravaggio (1610) Il Martirio di Sant’Orsola (@ Palazzo Zevallos Stigliano) http://4sq.com/cMQ5l4 #
RT @nicolamattina: Dice il Vaticano che… translation: The Vatican says that hell will be harder for pedophiles – great deterrent! #
Yo-yo championship going on in Goldfn Gate park. Always something in this city! #
It appears that girl yo-yoers are rare. #
http://twitpic.com/1s8gvp Silvia #
This place wd be still more fun with a kid. #
a nice day out at market, museum, and park ended with an excellent Persian dinner at Lavash http://bit.ly/cTVVfd #
thanks to one Woodstocker, today saw another I hadn’t seen in years. Somehow we always have interesting lives. Persian meal was appropriate. #
Countries Beginning with I The Original Basilisk Stare http://bit.ly/c7POE6 #
They thought they wanted to be taken out of themselves, and every art humans dreamt up took them further /in/. Terry Pratchett #
just tried this, works pretty well: Clean Your Bathtub With A Grapefruit & Salt http://bit.ly/aCHHoV #
@NomdeB if the chemistry is right, I suspect, the person looks good to /you/ regardless of third-party opinions on their looks. #
@NomdeB and that’s what they sell on shopping channels for 20, right? 😉 I don’t think I actually own silver cutlery etc at the moment #
had forgotten about these, nice collab between Ross’ photos and my video http://bit.ly/du48dP #
@billstreeter I suspect Malia is wiser, kinder, and infinitely more mature than Glenn Beck. She who laughs last… #
new video: Observing Your App and Everything Else it Runs on Using DTrace – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/9fxpVF #
Countries Beginning with I Home Update http://bit.ly/bHBkWU #
Hmm. I post a DTrace video on a (US) holiday weekend and it gets retweeted six times. I guess I can see what folks want more of! #
RT @NomdeB: @DeirdreS Oh that is the CUTEST stuffed sheep… – isn’t he great? He goes baaaaah, too. #
@hosamalali Observing Your App and Everything Else it Runs on Using DTrace – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/9fxpVF #
for those who want more, all my DTrace video can be found here: http://bit.ly/anHOwN #
Oracle Solaris is the number one choice for mission-critical systems http://bit.ly/dhBMHQ #
a video recipe for the holiday feast: sticky chewy Chinese BBQ ribs http://bit.ly/cENtxC #
Countries Beginning with I Conversation in a Bar http://bit.ly/cKJ6wG #
if you were on holiday this wkd and missed it, new vid: Observing Your App and Everything Else it Runs on Using DTrace http://bit.ly/9fxpVF #
@bubbva Remind me where you are, I can probably take them home on the train today #
@italylogue Gattuso! Yay! #
@bubbva perfect timing: got home to find my new planter box had arrived from Amazon #
video replay: TechCast on Oracle Solaris Virtualization – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/c0h4UB #
@montymunford Dum Maro Dum as a movie? Huh. #
@montymunford The most fun to play, I suspect. And now you’ve met another famous dastard, Tenzing. #
@bubbva yes, they look pretty happy this morning #
Work today was mostly about moving boxes, opening them up to see exactly what was inside, counting up, and putting away again. #
@jlb13 umm, no, don’t do that. You’d probably be arrested for suspicious behavior. #
Seeing a big white Apple logo go up on Moscone Center. I guess there’s a conference coming. I could be within spitting distance of Jobs. Yay #
@craigmorgan Argh. My neighborhood will be crawling with Apple fanboys. Think I’ll go hang out in the Castro. #
@NomdeB Maybe Al and Tipper broke up in disagreement over lyrics? #
daily LOL: Indian Arranged Marriage http://bit.ly/aBc6sq #
@dfugate sounds as if you could barter for each others’ services #
@#^#^ allergy season. Lots of intellectually-demanding work to do, and I feel as if my head is stuffed with cotton. #
I get twitchy when people tell me they don’t possess a valid passport. If that were me, I would go into an absolute panic. #
Fell down stairs onto concrete. Nothing broken, but the knee is going to hurt for a while. And the skinned finger. #
@bubbva @bsousapt made it to lunch and back, now icing the knee. Hard to touch type while trying to not bleed on the keyboard. Not my week! #
@jeffreytaylor Yay! Many many yay! #
Oracle Solaris Studio Express 6/10 is now available! http://developers.sun.com/sunstudio/downloads/express/index.jsp #StudioExpress #
someone who willfully and routinely asserts distortions as fact should not be given such a prominent platform. http://bit.ly/9kQeZY #
Need a way on Facebook to indicate have a deep, visceral, vomit-inducing hatred of. Y’know, NOT like. #
new video on the launch of Oracle Solaris Studio Express – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/aTktdW #
@bubbva I use TaxiMagic to order up Luxor cabs via GPS. Pay cash, tho – there’s a surcharge to use the app’s credit card feature. #
About to see shrek in 3d IMAX #
Today’s fall was sorta like falling off horses used to be. But that was onto sand, not concrete, and I was a lot younger. Ow, ow, ow. #
how did I manage to bang up my left arm and my right leg in the same fall? Must have been impressive to watch. Unintended acrobatics. #
@vdotw Ow! And of course instinct is to protect the child, so I bet the bruises were all yours. At least I didn’t bang my head. #
the new English that will emerge in the world, will come from India http://bit.ly/9N12NY – liberally mixed with Indian languages! #
up early to see my friend off back to Italy, not driving her – areas of pain all over my poor battered body #
Watching a second big white apple go up on Moscone North. Kinda miss the old rainbow apple. #
Small wounds can be surprisingly painful. Time to find out what it’s like to shower with a lot of skin missing from one finger. #
@jlb13 Probably vaudeville, though everyone who saw it was kindly concerned, including a FedEx guy with a Texas Longhorns cap on. #
@NomdeB Should be fine on my shots, with all the travel. It’s just one of those stupid little wounds that will be annoying until it closes. #
@vdotw Fun, mommy! Do it again! #
Hmm, I’d lost sight of this one: Examining ZFS On-Disk Format Using mdb and zdb: Max Bruning – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/cYXCq6 #
here’s one for the storage performance geeks: Visualizing System Latency – ACM Queue http://bit.ly/bhq75o #
It’s a beautiful Saturday morning in SF, feeling relaxed and happy and wondering – very idly – what to do with the day. #
@NomdeB hmm, yes, but all too much effort for this weekend. We drove down to Santa Cruz last, next week I get very busy with film course… #
@NomdeB lazy day on my nice sunny balcony would also qualify #
@urbanturbanguy uh oh, now I have to work at being scintillating and fascinating! #
@NomdeB Shrek was great, would have been impressive even in plain old flat screen. And fun. #
RT @stevewoolf: At this moment: web video writer’s group http://flic.kr/p/87T3EK – where? #
Countries Beginning with I Balcony Garden http://bit.ly/d5jmUy #
@urbanturbanguy AGGGHHHHH! Uh, no. Totally out of my demographic. Will you settle for SRK? #
re. balcony garden, am resisting the temptation to buy window boxes to hang along the rails. Need a big indoor plant, but bored of the usual #
also, just rearranged the living room, which is easy to do when furniture = 1 twin bed, 1 sm armchair, 2 end tables, cowskin, cushions #
@urbanturbanguy I follow @sachin_rt as well, but he doesn’t tweet as often. SRK is both entertaining and sweet Both seem like nice guys IRL. #
scared off the city pigeons from balcony with squirts of water, now scruffy finches are back, and getting bolder. Gonna be in the house soon #
drinking Malbec, eating Toblerone, watcing HP6. A nice way to spend Saturday night after a hectic week. #
People change and forget to tell each other, http://nyti.ms/bX6fvv #
driving back from Santa Cruz last wkd, passed a sports car on Hwy 17 with the license plate Teramo. Huh. http://bit.ly/d1CQVS #
Americans are genetically risk-takers, descended from people who upped & left their home countries, taking a huge risk to build a new life. #
…What does that do to/for our society, our economy, our national psyche? #
@helena_andrews In books, I recommend Chelsea Quinn Yarbro’s Saint Germain series, but go back to the older ones like Blood Games #bdjm #
@helena_andrews I discuss some more vampire books etc. you might like here: http://bit.ly/cKRoO5 #
@johnnysunshine Going back to the original human diaspora is taking it a bit far; recent history is far more likely to affect current soc #
I can think of a million things I would rather do than wrestle with the corp VPN today… #
@johnnysunshine NB What I said also applies to Canadians, a bit differently to Aussies/Kiwis. #
Forgot how cute Bring it On is #
RT @jlb13: Holy crap, real daiquiris are awesome. #IBA #ftw – recipe? #
a little light viewing for a Sunday evening – Performance: The Not a Problem Problem – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/c50vgM #
@mjasay Kids on planes are fine when parents at least TRY to make it easier on fellow passengers. Some seem to abdicate all responsibility. #
Does Andouille sausage go with pierogis? #
@SaraD I had shoes my daughter wanted to wear, but by the time her feet were big enough she’d mostly lost interest. Except for that one pair #
@SaraD they have, in fact, mysteriously disappeared! #
Oh, yes, WWDC is in my ‘hood this week. I fled to Menlo Park. #
video fixed! Performance: The Not a Problem Problem – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/a09Tuq #
Spent the train trip writing an article, haven’t done that in a while. #
Oh, yes, WWDC is in my ‘hood this week. I fled to Menlo Park. #
Day did not start well. Having no wifiOn campus is not improving it #
Shakedown cruise on new cafeteria not going well, v slow lines. How much employee time are we wasting? #
video fixed! Performance: The Not a Problem Problem – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/a09Tuq #
Moved more boxes around today. Somehow I became the tsar of t-shirts. #
@dave_miner you’re right, there was an upside. #
film course delayed by a week which, in the current state of my life, feels almost like a vacation. Or at least a reprieve. #
@jessicacolley please let me know what you hear – I’ll have to deal with that sooner or later. #
new: Brendan Gregg and Roch Bourbonnais share the thought process they use to troubleshoot system performance problems http://bit.ly/99NOWb #
RT @faseidl: Tim Minchin never pulls a punch – The Good Book (Live) http://bit.ly/93hAKe – Rock! Thanks! #
If God is real, and religious believers can perceive him… why is anyone an atheist? http://bit.ly/90Z96g #
RT @vicweast: the contortions attempted to control women’s sexuality are truly astonishing: http://tiny.cc/l5lld #
@montymunford I had a lot of cute young Brazilian guys want their picture taken with me, if that counts. 😉 #
Still working on my article about the #deliveringhappiness book @zappos hey, at least it’ll be long. #
RT @om: Kids are like farts, you can tolerate only your own: brazilian st saying – Italians say Every cockroach is beautiful to its mother #
Liaise, liaise, liaise… Yes, that’s what I’ve been doing all morning. And counting t-shirts. #
who’s at MPK today? Contact me. Stuff to give away. #
more T-shirts?!? #
RT @oracletechnet: @JavaOneConf & @oracledevelop are best sources of up-to-date info about those respective conferences #socialmediaoverload #
@rbanffy Menlo Park, a bit out of geographic range for you I’m afraid. #
@montymunford wow, your own stunts, too! In the best #bollywood tradition #
@montymunford Do try not to be hospitalized. #
nothing like starting the day with a credit card hassle #
CC co sorted it quickly. Customer svc seems to be improving across all companies. Anything’s better thn Telecom Italia http://bit.ly/bLMd1p #
Given all I’ve just read about @zappos, shoulda expected it: rec’d 2 hardback copies of #deliveringhappiness book from Amazon. #
They don’t feel safe in coming out because they are afraid of repercussions on their family or professional life, http://bit.ly/aem7su #
Learned on Twitter: many ppl I consider otherwise rational & intelligent are obsessed with sports. I don’t get that, any more than religion. #
Dunno why the v thot of DMV makes me tense, actual experiences not bad. Too many yrs of Italian bureaucracy? #
@NomdeB that whole tribalism thing eludes me. We belong to the v small but v inclusive tribe of Woodstockers, I guess. #
@NomdeB people are always looking for an us to belong to and a them to exclude. Blah. #
Looks as if I’ll be here a while. This may end up being a personal day, except for the working dinner tonight. #
The DMV employee standing in front of the car asks: is it 2 door or 4 door? 4 wheels? ?????! #
Took an hr to get car VIN officially looked at. Now waiting fr my # to be called. Adding statewide lost productivity to CA budget probs #
When I was in college, we were boycotting apartheid South Africa. So happy to see it host the World Cup. #
RT @NomdeB: @ProfOrganizer Any advice for @kdoland on Roman hotels? – not from me, but @italylogue can probably point you #
the DMV adventure ended, after 1.5 hours & chat w nice Lithuanian about FIFA, in triumph & new license plates. Fll’d by burger & choc shake #
Italians are largely oblivious to the routine trampling on the rights of suspects & others caught up in investigations. http://bit.ly/avu9jt #
@saraford I asked my cuz, once a zydeco instructor, what zydeco dance was like. It’s like having sex, only standing up. Works for me! #
Is @saraford intimidated by anything? 😉 I doubt it. #
It’s good when colleagues are also friends with whom you can share laughs over a bottle of wine. Team-building at its best! #
@bklein34 One of the most important uses of twitter is blowing off steam about relatives who upset us – preferablly without them knowing. #
@elizadushku you make dork look awfully good. #
nothing like starting the day with a financial screwup due to their damned confusing website… #
RT @NomdeB: Jai Ho! AR Rahman World Tour. http://bit.ly/cMeCXT – he’s in SF June 26th – Oracle Arena. – Woohoo! Who’s coming with me? #
ZFS Discovery Day: Demo – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/9sU6NK #
dunno why this disappeared off the blog, but it’s back now: Performance: Experimentation – Oracle Solaris Video http://bit.ly/99NOWb #
At SF’s Old 1st Presby for #sfgmc concert of Rutter’s Magnificat. #
RT @StopBeck: Glenn Beck says Obama has a reaction to typical white people bred into him. http://bit.ly/c06Wte – he hated his own mother? #
http://twitpic.com/1w9drs dueling social media @sfgmc Magnificat concert #
SF Girls’ Chorus Alumnae amazing! #
RT @davewiner: Naked bicyclists in the Mission. http://r2.ly/3zfj – that just looks uncomfortable #
Passed a passel of hard-looking women, dressed to the 9s with f*ck-me shoes. What’s up at sfmoma tonight? #
wake me up when it’s over #
Skyy ginger vodka + San Pellegrino limonata + blueberries = killer summer cocktail. #
Thou Our Refuge sung by @sfgmc http://bit.ly/acTEsG #
@jeffreytaylor you’re welcome, lots more to come! How was the evening concert #
@jeffreytaylor Fantastic! So well-deserved! #
Damn. I think I’ve painted myself into a corner with my review of the #deliveringhappiness book. #
@SFGMC watch this space – more on the way! Thanks for a fantastic performance. #
Damn, not enough time to see my friend at the Crafts Fair in Berkeley before my 1:15 hair appointment. Too much running around for a weekend #
Countries Beginning with I Delivering Happiness – read, comment, and win a copy @dhbook http://bit.ly/bWqDd3 #
been a while since I exercised my writing muscles (the ones in my brain). That was fun… #
Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose
When I heard Tony Hsieh speak at SxSWi in 2009, I was only vaguely aware of Zappos.com, and that mostly because of their advertising and wifi sponsorship in Denver airport. I couldn’t imagine wanting to buy shoes online, so never bothered to look at the site.
However, Hshieh’s talk caught my attention. Here was a company visibly practicing many of the principles of customer service – and its importance in a company – that I had developed for myself in the course of my career, but had had little opportunity to implement. I realized long ago that truly great customer service would require a corporate culture and mindset quite different from the ones I was working in or dealing with, but I alone could not effect the necessary changes.
I have cared about good customer service, both receiving and giving, for a long time. Starting in 1993, I provided great customer service for Incat and Adaptec by being visible and responsive in early online forums (Usenet, email, discussion lists, newsletter). Eventually I was allowed to scale my efforts by hiring a couple of guys who could answer questions as well as I could. But there were huge obstacles to great customer service, such as the lack of communication and data-sharing between the internal groups at the company who dealt with customers. This siloing within companies seems to happen a lot and be considered normal, so it was difficult to get my colleagues to understand that customers neither know nor care about a company’s internal systems and power struggles. To customers, it’s all one big entity, and they are understandably frustrated when the customer service team doesn’t know what sales or support are doing or, worse, they all contradict each other.
There was a smart VP who immediately understood the problem when I presented a graphic showing all the different information stores at the company and how they did (and didn’t) connect to each other. He wanted to try to fix the situation, but soon we were all sidetracked by the spinoff of Roxio, which required us to build new systems and sites from the ground up. As webmaster, I spent 14 hours a day on that for many months, but (as I dimly recall – it was a crazy time) still tried to keep in sight my long-term goal of creating a great customer experience right across the company.
I was ahead of the curve. Long before “user community” became a fashionable term, I realized that our community of customers could help each other far more effectively than we could ever help them: there were simply far more of them than us, and they were using our products in ways than we couldn’t test in the lab. We just needed to help them to communicate with each other, and put some human intelligence into organizing the information they produced.
The kinds of online forums in widespread use today were not well known in 2000, but I designed some nascent social media features into the new Roxio website, and tried to make it a showcase for our users rather than just brochure-ware for our products. I also worked closely with our new tech support organization, trying to keep us all heading in the same direction.
For personal and professional reasons, I left that job in 2001 and went back to Italy (where my family was), so I never got to see whether my ideals of customer service were realized at Roxio.
A few years later, at TVBLOB, I chose “Director of Customer Experience” as my title because I hoped to instill in this new company, from the beginning, a culture of great customer service. We were trying to introduce an entirely new kind of technology to a mass audience, and I felt we would succeed or fail on how our end-user customers felt about us. This would, in turn, be a function of their entire user experience, from product interfaces to sales calls to technical support; it would be critically important to have all these areas aligned behind the same vision of how things should look to customers. I’m not sure whether this could have been achieved in that particular company, but personal and professional considerations took me out of that job before we even had end users.
In summary: I have long cared a a great deal about treating customers well, but realized that truly great customer service would require a corporate culture and mindset quite different from the ones I found myself immersed in. Though I tried very hard for years, I alone could not effect the changes needed. I was left with a vague hope that, somewhere, someday, some company might get it right, and I might even be part of making it happen.
So, back to Tony:
Zappos sounded like a great place to work: they were getting customer service right, and this was proving out for them, financially and otherwise. When I heard Hsieh speak a SxSWi I was intrigued enough to consider having a look at their job openings. But my job at Sun was exciting and fun, and I had no desire to move to Las Vegas, Zappos’ home base. Seven months later Zappos became part of Amazon, a piece of news I somehow missed (had quite a lot going on in my own life at the time).
Still, I was now aware of Zappos and what it was really about (hint: it’s not shoes!). So, when someone recently tweeted about the Delivering Happiness project around Hsieh’s new book, I signed up. I had an ulterior motive: we, too, have books to sell
So I was surprised a couple of weeks ago to receive a package with two advance copies of the Delivering Happiness book, with the request that I post a review on my blog during the week of June 7th, the book’s release date. This week has been tumultuous (on a par with just about every other week in my life in, oh, say, the last three years…), but here I am.
(Yes, this is meant to be a book review.)
Delivering Happiness, at 244 pages, is a quick read written in a chatty, friendly style – quite different in both tone and content from the usual “How to Succeed in Business” books.
In the first section, Hsieh covers his own life as an entrepreneur (since childhood!) through the creation and sale of LinkExchange, a dot.com success from which he walked away with quite a lot of pocket change, and some even more valuable lessons. When we can’t learn by direct experience, the next best way to absorb and retain information is via stories, and Hsieh generously shares his business lessons through engaging stories from his own life.
Though I was working in high tech during the boom, I never managed to get rich. I imagined that those who did went off with their millions, bought fancy houses and cars, and never worried about anything again. This wasn’t the case with Hsieh. He mentions that “experiences were much more important to me than material things.” Well, his post-LinkExchange experiences included nearly going broke during the early years of keeping Zappos afloat.
The second section of the book is a history of Zappos and how the founders came to believe that their company was really about customer service, rather than the specific products they sold – after all, anyone could sell the same products. Zappos would differentiate itself by providing the best customer service in the world, and they realized that this would require a different kind of company from top to bottom, bottom to top, outside in and inside out. I won’t spoil the story by telling you how; the book offers many examples of how Zappos creates and sustains the necessary corporate culture.
Some of these examples are presented in the form of short essays written by employees. That, in itself, gives you a clue: employees are encouraged to think with their own heads, use their own voices and words, and decide for themselves how best to please a customer, rather than read from canned scripts and act from a limited list of options.
The Hollywood climax of the story is that Zappos “married” Amazon. You can read something very close to that section of the book here. Like most people in high tech, I’ve been through several corporate buyouts/mergers, and they always make for, um, interesting times. What’s interesting about Zappos and Amazon is that, while both do great customer service (I wrote about my love for Amazon years ago), they approach it quite differently. They chose for Zappos to continue to operate independently, using Amazon’s technical and financial resources to be able to do some things (I’m betting with the website) that they couldn’t have done as quickly on their own. I’ll be curious someday to read a follow-up book about what each company is learning from the other.
In the final section of the book, Hsieh ventures into even bolder territory, sharing research he’s done on the new science of happiness and how that can be applied in a corporate environment. All good stuff, I shall certainly do some of the reading he recommends. The new happiness research quoted by Hsieh shows that people are happy when they feel that they: have control over their lives, are making progress towards a goal, are connected to other people, and are part of something bigger than themselves.
All of this can be applied to running a company, as Zappos is doing brilliantly. But applying it to the act of a customer receiving a shipment is a stretch in a direction I don’t like. I’m wary of the idea that happiness can be delivered in a box in the form of “the perfect pair of shoes or the perfect outfit”. Consumer culture has conditioned us to believe that happiness lies in stuff (or experiences) that can be bought. This may be an inescapable contradiction of capitalism. Companies and economies grow because people buy more and more stuff. To keep them buying, you have to make them believe that your stuff is going to make them happy. But buying stuff is not really what makes people happy, and you are lying to your customers by telling them it will. And it’s not just a little white lie, either: “material goods will make us happy” is the biggest lie the human race has ever told itself. Voracious consumption is destroying our societies, ourselves, and our planet.
Which won’t make anyone very happy.
Tony Hsieh is a smart man and has no doubt seen this contradiction, but for the moment he’s still in the business of selling stuff, so he can’t state this even if he wants to. However, he now has deep pockets and a large soapbox to go with his considerable talents, brains, and charisma. I’ll be watching to see what happens when he turns all this to the question of what, ultimately, is really going to create global happiness.
ps. I already gave away one of the advance copies of the book, but I have an extra hardback copy that they sent me after it was released. If you comment on this post, you’re entered into a contest: one week from today I will randomly choose one commenter to receive one of those copies.
Paul Needle demonstrates some of ZFS’ features and capabilities. 57 mins
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