If they want to. If it’s important to them. For example: My kid has played hockey most of his life. We know some families where all the kids — boy or girl — play hockey, and almost all of them are good players. I don’t know any families where all the kids play hockey and they’re all bad. Those families have decided for some reason that it’s important for kids to play a good game of hockey. Another example: We live in a school district with a lot of Asian families. They don’t care about hockey. In Asian families, it’s important for the kids to be good at academics and music. You don’t see a lot of Asian guys in the National Hockey League, but you do see a lot of Asian kids at our nation’s best universities. It’s a parenting challenge — getting kids to assign importance to the… Read more →
Author Archive: Paul Epps
The Law of Conservation of Ignorance
A false conclusion once arrived at and widely accepted is not easily dislodged, and the less it is understood the more tenaciously it is held. Read more →
The Job of Our Time
The job of our time is to hospice the death of the old unsustainable systems and structures, and to midwife the birth of new sustainable systems and new ways of being. — Lynne Twist Read more →
EppsNet at the Movies: Day for Night
Day for Night (1973) Directed by François Truffaut. With Jacqueline Bisset, Jean-Pierre Léaud, François Truffaut, Valentina Cortese.. A movie about making a movie . . . The director says, “Making a film is like a stagecoach ride in the old west. When you start, you are hoping for a pleasant trip. By the halfway point, you just hope to survive.” Highly recommended! Read more →
Back to School 2011
Students of Irvine – I say to you what I used to say to my own kid: Do your best. Be a nice person. Let me know if you need any help. Read more →
Problems
I attribute my own problems to the trials of life. I attribute the problems of others to their personalities. Read more →
Aside
Some days you slap the panda, some days the panda slaps you.
Happy Labor Day
When there’s BBQ ribs to be eaten, it’s every man for himself. Wait, that’s sexist. Let me rephrase. When there’s BBQ ribs to be eaten, it’s every mf’er for themselves. Happy Labor Day! Read more →
Marco Polo
“You can’t fool me. I investigate things. I’m like Marco Polo.” “I don’t understand. How are you like Marco Polo?” “I investigate things.” “Are you thinking Marco Polo was a detective?” “Yeah. That guy who died last year.” “You mean Columbo?” “Right, Columbo.” Read more →
User-Centered Design
Design should: Make it easy to determine what actions are possible at any moment (make use of constraints). Make things visible, including the conceptual model of the system, the alternative actions, and the results of actions. Make it easy to evaluate the state of the system. Follow natural mappings between intentions and the required actions; between actions and the resulting effect; and between the information that is visible and the interpretation of the system state. In other words, make sure that (1) the user can figure out what to do, and (2) the user can tell what is going on. — Donald Norman, The Design of Everyday Things Read more →
Start by Visualizing Perfection
One can come at improvement from two angles: How can we make things suck less? or What is the ideal state that we should shoot for? I’m for the second option. It is the classic Lean approach to improvement, BTW: Start by visualizing perfection. — Mary Poppendieck Read more →
Refrigerators
Office email: A friendly reminder that all refrigerators will be cleaned out this Sunday. Please take anything home that you do not want thrown out. I do not want this carton of Macadamia Vanilla Bean ice cream to be thrown out. Wait — does it matter if I brought the item in, or just that I don’t want it to be thrown out? Read more →
Let Me Save You Some Time
Are you sick and tired of . . . ? Fill in anything and my answer will probably be yes. Read more →
Human Slingshot Slip and Slide
This Explains a Lot
When schoolchildren start paying union dues, that’s when I’ll start representing the interests of schoolchildren. — Albert Shanker, President of the United Federation of Teachers (1964-1984) and President of the American Federation of Teachers (1974-1997) Read more →
Success will never be a big step in the future; success is a small step taken just now. — Jonatan Mårtensson
Aside
Signal vs. Noise: A shorthand for designing UI flows
What Are the Laker Girls Going to Do?
The Laker Girls 2011 squad has been selected. (You can watch the auditions.) But with no Laker games, what are they going to do? Idea: Come over to the office, stand behind me all day and dance around every time I school someone. “Bob, let me be direct. Your idea has one problem. It’s stupid.” OHHHHHHH! Loud music! Dancing! Cheering! Read more →
Aside
Tiny Buddha: 50 Ways to Find Inspiration
Your Time is Limited
Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary. — Steve Jobs Read more →