Blog
Welcome to my writing place. You will find articles, notes and annotated links here and can subscribe to their feed once or individually.
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as Note When Apple presented the iPhone Xr this year I was tempted to buy it as soon as possible. This was in total contrast to what I wanted to do before the announcement—not buying a new phone this year. Every two years my contract with Vodafone renews and gives me the chance to get a new smartphone. And every time Apple holds a keynote they achieve to convince people that their new product is more … -
as Note On Wednesday I was asking a colleague what his plans for today are and he replied that he’s on his way to go surfing but would have about 15 minutes to talk about our project now if I like. I thought that’s way enough time to talk about task management etc and called him while he was on the bus to the beach. But I was wrong; he didn’t wanted to talk about tasks but about our problem of the last …15 Minutes On The Bus
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as Note The Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi says in this Recode Code 2018 Video that he wants Uber to be the Amazon of transportation. It baffles me that a billion dollar company cannot come up with a better vision than to compare itself and copy a concept from Amazon. Shira Ovide from Bloomberg tends to agree but Uber still is valued billions of Dollars and while not profitable at all, still gets a lot of …“Uber CEO: Amazon of transportation”
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as Article You in business? What are you doing to last? Not to grow. Not to gain. Not to take. Not to win. But to last? —Jason Fried in Outlasting It describes the way I build software and websites since ever — building a thing that lasts for as long as I can imagine it to last. In the past, I related this to how I create a codebase so that it lasts for years and will be reliable and readable by other …Built to Last
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as Note I’m collecting a list of companies or products that are not only over-financed hipster brands but instead have a real purpose as a company to succeed and be sustainable from the start. Ideally, the companies or products should also care about ethics and mostly about the human side of their clients. As an example, the outdoor company Patagonia would be an example of a sustainable company which …🤔 Ask Product Hunt: “<a href=" https://www.producthunt.com/ask/8776-what-are-the-most-inspiring-sustainable-ethical-companies">What are the most inspiring sustainable, ethical companies?</a>”
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as Note As you can already see this site has gotten a new look yesterday. But not only a new look but a new technical basis and a new content strategy. In the past I had a website showing what I do as developer. But I am much more than a developer and people want to know about it as well. In times where you know a lot of people virtually from Twitter or other social media networks, it’s even more …New look for this site
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as Note Today I read an interview which I really enjoyed. It contained some great inspiration tipps but one thing is still stuck in my head: “I … start my day by meditating. … I then rush to get to work by 9am” — Interview Maria Gonzalez from Slack at InterfaceLovers Please don’t ruin your meditation practice immediately afterwards. Try to establish a day led by your meditation practice—calm, focused, …Don’t ruin your calming practice right afterwards
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as Article I’m a big fan of decentralized solutions and advocate for them a lot. But the claim by technologists for building decentralized services as a response to unethical behavior is wrong. If we try to solve the underlying humanitarian issue with technology, nothing changes. Decentralized services are a good idea to share responsibility and own your data. But they’re not going to prevent people from …Decentralized won’t fix unethical behavior
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as Article Facebook’s Press Release after the Cambridge Analytica story unfolded is one perfect way to show how the whole company thinks. While it’s clear that Facebook didn’t follow their claim to “Protecting people’s information is the most important thing we do at Facebook.”, they declare it Cambridge Analytica’s fault that they used data that Facebook and their users gave them unnecessarily. The whole …You design your service
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as Article “Trust yourself and your decision you just made.” Something I said yesterday during a meeting and only later realized the true value of it and its meaning.Trust yourself
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as Article When you build something, it’s hard to decide whether it’s good enough or not to release it to the public. But improving something is even harder due to the infinity of possible solutions. This is known as the common issue of not being able to validate a change binary: A common approach to problem solving is to consider it binary. Either you’ve fixed the issue or you haven’t. Some problems fit …Making Things <strong>Better</strong>
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as Note Here’s a bold statement: Using acronyms is hurting people. Elon Musk already declared a company rule effective for all employees in 2010, effectively ending the use of acronyms and appreviations for the entire company: “Individually, a few acronyms here and there may not seem so bad, but if a thousand people are making these up, over time the result will be a huge glossary that we have to issue …<s>KISS</s> or <s>YAGNI</s>: Avoid acronyms and abbreviations if you want to be liked.
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as Note Katie Womersley: “(…) our global spread means almost 24/7, Slack is a hub of activity and people feel they’re missing out on work. This is especially tough on our Asia-Pacific teammates, who end up left out of discussions and conversations, and folks with responsibilities who needed to work different hours and be offline during parts of their workday (like parents!).” I’m so familiar with this …I Turned Slack <s>Off</s> for a Week.
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as Article Ethical Design is a term often used by various people in the past year and now even predicted as a trend for 2018. Interestingly, when you read more about what it means you get a variety of responses. It lasts from the user experience over sustainability to business concepts. And in fact, it’s a mixture of all and cannot be a trend—instead it must be a requirement for us as human beings. When we …<strong>Ethical Design</strong> And Sustainability On The Web
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as Article Today is the day for me and my colleagues Tobias and Holger. Today we launched Colloq, a new event platform for organizers, speakers and attendees. We’ve worked for over one year on it and are proud to finally have launched our service to the public. If you want the official news, you can head over and read the announcement post on the Colloq blog. Here I’m going to share a more personal view. …<strong>Colloq</strong> is there!
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as Article I’m on vacation and today I worked for two hours. Yesterday for one. Before that, some minutes per day perhaps, mostly nothing. I plan to do nothing again over the next days but can’t promise. How about you — do you know the feeling of overwhelming work when you come back from vacation? Do you feel exhausted right after the first day back in office? That’s what is common to me and I want to avoid …<strong>Off Time Balance</strong>
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as Micro Morning Swim
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as Article One year ago I purchased a VW T5 van with the goal of transforming the van into a camping car for my own adventures. Now I found the time to write up what I did and show you how. First of all, let me say I’m really thankful to my dad and to my best friend who both advised me so much with useful insights and tips and my dad for showing me how to manufacture the wooden interior properly. In summary …Building a custom <strong>VW Camping Car</strong>—DIY style
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as Note Here we go, that’s my new Espresso machine, a Rocket Giotto v3 together with a Mazzer Mini B grinder. After years with my still beloved and quite satisfying Saeco Aroma which stays with me since over 8 years now, I decided to level up a bit. I’m still very new to the new machines and it’s certainly different to my previous machine. The espresso tastes totally different to what I’m used to (much …☕️ New Espresso Machine 🚀
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as Note Flattr just announced they’re now part of eyeo, makers of AdBlock Plus. Time to say goodbye, and no it’s mainly due to a different reason. When Flattr announced their revamped product yesterday via email, they also announced that they’re now part of eyeo (they seem to already be, without notifying anyone earlier). That’s a huge bummer as the makers of AdBlock Plus are a highly questionable …Dear Flattr, <strong>bye bye!</strong>